The Veil
by belladonnacullen
Summary: You always have the choice between life and death... until you don't. There is poetry at the beginning and end of our journey, but it's what you make of the interim that counts. BxE, rated M, canon parings.
1. Chapter 1

Jessica Stanley is actively dying. She struggles to get out of her hospital bed each day, unwilling to give in to the inevitable. Slowly but surely, though, her body is breaking down its own muscle to survive. She is consuming herself. Skin stretches over bone. The only part of her body that is blossoming and growing is her abdomen. Her tumor does not know it, but soon its life will also be at an end.

Death has a look. It is stretched and thin. It is brittle and soft all at once: brittle bones, hair, skin, nails – and a soft look in the eyes at sundown, like a veil between the living and the dead. Ms. Stanley's veil is more opaque each day.

"The plan is still the same, Doctor Swan. Right?"

"Yes, it's still the same."

She plans to get stronger before starting chemo and radiation.

She'll never start chemo and radiation. We both know. The knowledge lives in her veiled brown eyes. We speak in code that exists between the doctor and the dying.

"That's good," she says.

I hold her hand. I smile.

"Those small pills you give me are like magic. They make me feel better. They are the only thing."

"I'm so glad."

"My daughter. She's coming tomorrow. I want to rest so I'm awake when she visits."

Her daughter is seven years old, full of life and energy. The nurses say she dances around her mother's hospital room.

"Would you like something to help, then?" I ask.

"Some of the Ativan, maybe?" she suggests.

"I'll tell the nurse."

"Thank you, Doctor."

Death keeps people awake even as they lose their energy to exist. Death starves people for rest, starves them for food, and leaves its inhabitants anxiously seeking respite even as they fight to live another day.

Death. I wonder if I'll run from it. Will I welcome it with open arms? I gently close the door to room three-oh-three. I don't have to think of death again, until tomorrow.

xXxXx

I shower off the sadness and the worry. Warm water revives. I take pleasure in the pinking of my skin. I feel the life underneath the surface and I'm glad. Shaving, shampooing, drying and dusting, slipping on lingerie. Cozy in a robe, I tiptoe down stairs. Red wine is waiting. So is Edward.

"Feel better?" he asks. He kneads my shoulders with large hands. My home is dark and comforting. Stainless steel shines under dim light. A kettle is on. Gas glows blue beneath.

I sip burgundy. I nod. I settle into a chair Indian style.

"Would you like some dinner?" he asks.

I shake my head. Dinnertime is long past. "Just a snack maybe," I suggest.

"You're wasting away," he sighs, his hands running down my arms. His mouth is at my neck. He inhales and it sends shivers down my spine.

"You're concerned with my _weight_? Really?" I ask.

A nose runs down my neck. A hand finds it's way underneath my robe.

"You concern me."

"Which part of you is concerned?" I wonder, turning my head and placing my lips over his, letting a hand stray behind me and over his crotch.

My robe is slipped from my shoulders; my chair is pulled from the table. His fingers skim over satin and lace.

"You consume me," he rumbles.

I can't help but giggle. It's clearly the other way around. It feels so good to laugh that I go with it. Edward doesn't let the small sounds get in the way.

My bra is carefully unhooked and I'm pushed up against the smooth tabletop, like my breasts are what's for dinner. Hard hands slide my panties lower. His mouth closes over my neck.

Eternity is just a kiss away.

My nights are my dreams. My nights are my temptation. My nights are the security blanket that keep me sane.

xXxXx

Mike Newton's family talks about the future. They are so focused on it, that they hardly see the man in the bed.

"So, this medicine…" Tess Newton says as she studies the notes she's taken over the course of the last few days. "We won't know if it's worked for a few months?"

"Weeks," I correct. "Just weeks."

Mike doesn't necessarily have weeks. He's lost fifteen percent of his body weight in less than one.

"And if this medicine stops working, his platelets will go even lower?"

"They can't get much lower than they are now," I explain.

"If it works, though, he can come home."

"I don't know that it will work. He needs progenitor cells in his marrow, and at the state of his illness -"

"It could work," she insists.

I sigh.

The dance of the dying is more complex when family is present. Mr. Newton looks on with wide, veiled eyes. We don't need to speak. We know, Mr. Newton and I. I squeeze his hand before I leave his room.

xXxXx

"Three and a half years," Alice explains. "After that, Alaska." She spins in her office chair and sips her green tea.

Her husband, Jasper is a surgical resident. She waits out his residency and looks towards brighter, Arctic horizons.

"I'm thinking something integrative, something more upscale." She sweeps her hand in front of her, like she can see it all now – instead of the beige office wall.

"Upscale?" I ask with raised eyebrows.

"You know what I mean," she insists.

I know what she means: boutique oncology. Death for the rich. It comes with high-end wigs and acupuncture, with essential oils and exotic plants.

"What about you, Bella?"

"Me?"

"How long?"

"I haven't thought about it."

I have, though. I can't explain where my head is at. There is something here that I'm just on the edge of… something close. And I'm needed. Alice and I, and all of the oncologists here are needed.

"No one can do this forever," she insists.

That, at least, is true.

xXxXx

Nighttime, in Edward's arms, his breath in my hair. "You are my life now," he whispers.

I wrap my limbs tighter. I don't want space between us. I need his hands to make me come alive. I need him to light these dark times I have away.

"I'll love you forever," he breathes as he rolls a nipple between rough finger pads.

There is no forever. Not for me.

"No forever tonight," I insist.

He sighs.

"Just now," I request climbing astride. There's no lingerie tonight. I want skin on skin, slipping against satin sheets. Men in this position don't often argue. Edward is no different. His hands grip my hips, pressing our bodies together where it counts. Forward, up, down, we both groan as he fits inside.

I slide; he pumps. I press thighs, he grabs my ass.

"Come here," he demands.

I fall forward and his lips catch mine. He sets the pace. His biceps flex as he rocks me forward. Faster, harder… I sweat, I tingle. He tugs my hair; I arch my back.

His lips close over my breast.

Eternity is just a kiss away.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Um... No beta, no pre-reader. This is dark and stark and probably not for everyone. This was getting in the way of my current fic, so I wrote it down to clear my head. I'm an open book, really. I love vampires and I work in medicine because I'm obsessed and in awe of death. **

**If you're looking for something light and fluffy, check out the mash-up I'm writing with FictionFreak95 and Troublefollow1017. It's a fun little fic about a teenage adventure with the three kids from our fics: There is a Light, Edward Cullen, Dick for Hire, and Fridays at Noon. http : / / www . fanfiction . net / s / 7757948 / 1 /**

**I'm working on Bare Naked, Bone Deep and hope to have the next chapter out soon. Believe me, this won't get in the way. This I could write in my sleep.**

**xxx, ~M (bdc)**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Thank you for holding your breath and taking the chance.**

* * *

><p>"I don't like this new man you're seeing."<p>

"You've never met the new man I'm seeing."

"My point exactly."

My mother surveys my house; picking up a vase here, reading a book title there.

"He's… private."

"And anonymous," she insists, looking through my magazines, searching out some evidence of a Y chromosome.

"_He_ has a name."

My mother raises eyebrows.

"Edward," I breathe and shiver. I feel his hands whenever I say it aloud. Around my mother that feeling is indecent, to say the least.

"_Edward_ keeps you from me," she clucks as she follows me into the kitchen.

I focus on cabinetry. I choose a mug. I slide the jar of honey her way.

"I'm busy, Mom."

Her gaze drifts past me and up the stairs. "Busy."

"Mom!"

"Bella. I need to see my daughter. And I am not opposed to seeing her – boyfriend?"

Her voice is hopeful. I grit my teeth and pour water.

"I'll make time," I assure, as I hand her a steaming porcelain mug.

Her small hand grasps my chin instead of the proffered beverage. Her eyes are glassy and stern. "I am going to hold you to that, Isabella. Please do."

xXxXx

Room three-oh-three.

"Not a good day today, Ms. Stanley?" I ask quietly. The answer is written on her face. She doesn't open her eyes. She doesn't lift her head from the pillow.

"No," she breathes and tries to shake her head.

"She didn't eat. Just some broth," her sister informs from the shadow in the corner.

"How's your breathing?" I read the gauge on the oxygen meter for an answer, but listen for Jessica's voice for insight into her condition.

"Not so bad," she whispers.

She winces. She is much worse.

"Have you used this all day?"

Long, thin fingers graze the nasal canulla resting on her labrum. "Just now I asked for it. I was up. Praying." Her hand falls back on the mattress. I read the signs of death in the set of her shoulder and the angle of her arm.

The air in the room is fragile. The future is unmistakable and has taken shape; it presses in on each of us. We breathe it in and out. I'm long past choking, but Ms. Stanley is no longer immune. Her chest rises and falls unevenly, stuttering and stopping with knowledge born on every breath.

"She prays every day," her sister adds.

"I get up, and I pray."

"Prayer is good," I say. I settle by her side.

"Yes, Doctor," she agrees. She finally opens her eyes. They are frightened and dim. They quiver in the sockets with a frantic electric light. Jaundice has made inroads in the night.

"We can pray," I offer, my hand closing over hers. Her skin is like tissue paper. She cannot grip back.

"Thank you."

I close my eyes.

Minutes pass behind the veil – the most peaceful of my day.

xXxXx

"Do you pray?"

"Not in some time," Edward answers. I seek solace against his chest. Fresh air wafts through the window and I snuggle in. His chin rests atop my head. "My father did, though. He was a man of great faith… Do you?"

"I prayed today, with a patient."

Edward's arms clutch tighter. I wriggle against him, reveling in the feel of his bare skin against mine. His long legs reach past my feet and his pale skin glimmers against brown satin.

His mouth slides to my ear. "I would pray for you."

"But you already have me."

Edward chuckles. "Perhaps, but not in the way I'd prefer. Let me rephrase. I would pray _with_ you – if you needed it."

"I wouldn't know where to start."

His hands slip through my arms until he's hugging my breasts.

"_Pater noster, qui es in caelis_," he whispers in my ear. My body trembles.

"What's that?"

"The way to start - The Lord's Prayer."

"Do you know more?"

His lips slip to my neck. "_Sanctificetur nomen tuum_," he hums, murmuring his way to my collarbone.

I sigh. Thighs press together.

"_Adveniat regnum tuum."_

I roll to my side; a knee parts my legs. Hands clasp breasts; fingers find nipples. His mouth is occupied with my earlobe and the only sound is the scuttle of dry leaves against the downspouts.

"Thy will be done?" I prompt, hoping for more.

His breath baths my shoulder.

"_Sicut in caelo et in terra." _The words ripple and roll over my skin._  
><em>

Edward presses my body against his and holds my top leg folded against my chest. He plunges and rocks, filling me completely. I'm lost in the lull of his voice and the rhythm of his cock.

"_Panem nostrum quotidianum da nobis hodie,_

_et dimitte nobis debita nostra sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris._

_Et ne nos inducas in tentationem,_

_sed libera nos a malo._

_Amen."_

xXxXx

I've given in.

His finger traces the rim of his steaming cup of coffee. My mother leans close, pushing photos from field hockey in junior high.

I tumble on the den carpet with my three-year old niece.

"I'm gonna' get you, Auntie Bella!"

Vivienne rears, charges and jumps with four limbs spread wide. I catch and throw her in the air. She screeches and giggles with eyes shut tight. I set her down on the ground. We rewind and repeat, and repeat, and repeat until my arms are weak.

"Time for bed, Viv." She's scooped up into my mother's arms. Edward is both awkward and handsome as he quietly observes from couch.

"No."

"Yes."

"No!"

"Say good night, to Auntie Bella and her boyfriend."

"Noooo!"

Stairs creak and little fists flail. I wave and smile. An arm wraps unexpectedly around my waist. I brush brown shag carpet from my body.

"Do you ever think maybe -"

My immediate shock silences him. I can't bring myself to look. I try to stem burgeoning anger.

"Surely we can talk in an _extremely_ abstract, hypothetical manner."

"No," I answer quickly. I sound like my niece.

"Never?" he wonders. "Be honest. We said we'd at least be honest."

I squeeze his hand. I take a seat and find myself consumed in overstuffed brown velvet. He sits at my feet, arms draped over knees. He is sincere and patient. I know he'd wait forever for an answer that I don't want to give up.

"Once," I mumble. Barbie and Ken were parents and an incongruously large baby doll was the embodiment of my childish dream. "As a child - a very long time ago. I thought I'd name her Emily."

"Her?"

The corners of his lips twitch, his cheeks dimple and I am reflected in his eyes.

"_Her_. A girl with brown hair who'd like to dance."

His feet slip forward and nudge mine.

"I love you, Isabella."

My mother sighs on the stairs.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: People have asked where I'm going with this. They've asked for a warning. I don't give away endings, but do heed the label: hurt/comfort. I'm humbled by all the experiences people have shared about their own loved ones. Thank you! My heart goes out to you. No matter how much time you've had to prepare, I don't think it's ever easy. I wish I could respond to individual reviews, but it's either reply or write. I'm choosing to write whenever I get the chance.**

**xxx, ~M**


	3. Chapter 3

"You love me?" I must be glowing. I'm sure I'm smiling like I've just won the lottery.

"Did you really have any doubt?" He grins as he slowly unbuttons my blouse and slips it from my shoulders. His fingers drag along my skin. His eyes glow in the dim light from lamp on my nightstand.

"Well, I knew you wanted me," I tease. "From the very beginning."

Edward smirks. He peels bra straps off my shoulders and his thumbs graze hardening nipples. "I don't want you any longer, though. I have you."

"You think you _have _me?" I challenge, giggling, trying to hold tight to feminist pride.

His fingers pinch and pull and I'm alight. I'm sure fireflies would be drawn to me in a darkened room.

"Deny it," he murmurs as he drags his mouth across my cheek and nips behind my ear.

I wince and whimper and push my breasts into his waiting hands, but when I go to embrace I realize that I'm pleasantly trapped by my blouse and bra.

He laps lightly and I shiver. "Deny it," he rumbles.

His large hands slide around to my ass leaving aching, uncovered breasts. He hitches up my skirt and tugs on my tights and panties. Cool air from the open window kisses bare flesh.

He has me.

"You love me?" I probe.

His hands still and he takes the barest hint of a step backwards, surveying, licking his lips. "If there was a word that meant more, I would use it." He unbuttons and unzips my skirt so that it slides to the floor – a denim puddle around stocking feet.

"Love, in its conventional sense, cannot capture what you do to me."

My head swims. I want to bottle this moment and drink it in small sips throughout the rest of my life.

His hands run around to my ass again and he pulls my body roughly against his. His hardening cock presses over my pubic bone. I burn where we touch.

"I love your ass and I love your tits. But love doesn't really come close to the rest... But maybe I just never knew."

My knees are weak and I'm grateful for his strong arms. His eyes leave no room for dispute.

"You love me," I whisper.

"Like air. Do you love me?"

"I…"

"Tell me?"

The world stops with his quiet plea, or I stop and the world spins around me. This was never supposed to be about love.

"You can be honest with me, Bella."

My heart pounds in my chest. "You make me feel… alive - so amazingly alive, more than before, even. Being with you, it's the best thing, almost ever. But I'm frightened by… what this means."

"I frighten you?" He twists the back of my blouse, pulling my arms behind, binding me in pinstriped cotton.

"No," I breathe.

"That's a start."

My blouse goes slack, and arms and legs and fabric grapple and shift until I'm on my back on the bed and he's between my thighs, his salty lips against mine, a hand fisting my hair, another grasping my hip. I pull off his tie, and register the clank of a belt and subtle zip of a fly. He's everywhere at once, and one place in particular, and my chest wants to burst open when he thrusts inside. Brought to the edge and tipped over, I see bursts of light. I close my eyes and see stars.

xXxXx

"I closed myself off from everything."

We're panting in one another's arms. We've kicked the covers and pillows off the bed. We lie on cream satin, held in sweet swells of night air.

"Everything except me?" he asks.

"_Until _you," I admit.

"Am I your consolation prize?"

"You are my gift."

xXxXx

"You're verging on morose. You know that?"

I nearly choke on spicy tuna. Vivienne sings about fish heads as she picks apart her California roll. My sister Rose has already devoured chicken tempura and beef katsu. She doesn't fuck with sushi, but she gives in to my request for Japanese food every time.

"Morose?" I ask when my food is safely swallowed and followed by a swig of saki.

"Don't even try to deny it."

I don't heed her warning. I try anyway. "I'm not morose, Rosalie."

"What's momrose?" Vivienne asks, and imitation crab tumbles out of her little mouth and onto her lap.

"Your Auntie Bella is, but don't talk with your mouth full, okay Hon?"

My niece giggles and what's left of her half eaten food escapes before her hand can reach her mouth to cover. I stretch across the low table to try to help her pick up damp pieces. "I am totally not morose," I explain to whoever will listen.

"You do realize you just spent ten minutes talking about death and dying people."

"That's not morose."

Rose pulls her iPhone out of her tote. "Excuse me while I look up the definition of morose."

"Dying is momrose, Auntie Bella?"

"No, it's not, Viv. Dying is a part of everyone's life."

"Life is momrose, then?" she asks, a little crease growing between her big, brown eyes.

"I don't care what you call it, Bella, but it's taken over."

"It's what I do."

"You're a doctor. I thought your job was kept people _alive_," she counters.

I laugh. Vivienne grins like she's in on the joke. Rosalie silently shakes her head. "It's a losing battle," I chuckle. I down another shot.

"Morose," Rosalie sings.

Vivienne joins in, giggling. _"Mom-rose, mom-rose, mom-rose, momrooose!"_

I wait until they've finished.

"I'm not depressed about death, Rose. I'm not in despair or denial. I don't even see patients' death as a failure. I don't know… I'm learning, maybe. There's something so easy at the end… something beautiful when we go back to where we came from. No one likes to talk about it, but it just is. It's perfect. Everyone's life is a story that comes full circle, and we can't fully explain the very beginning or the very end, but there it is. I get to watch."

Rose looks like she's solving a difficult algebra equation. "Okay. Not exactly morose."

"Thank you." I am vindicated.

"But if I were you, I'd be talking about my hot new boyfriend instead of all the people dropping dead around me."

"His hands weren't hot," Vivienne states.

"Oh, someone said he was hot," Rose chuckles.

I groan. I'd consider crawling underneath the table if it weren't just a foot off the ground. "Mom did _not_ say that… did she?"

"She said he's very handsome, and extremely polite, and that he wore a suit."

"And he laughed when I jumped," Vivienne adds.

"Oh, right. And she mentioned that he _loves_ you."

"Oh my god." I hide my face in my hands.

"Spill, lady. You let this one out of your bedroom. You brought him to mom's house, of all things. The secret's out. Talk!"

"He's… very…" I can't find the words to continue. I have never spoken about a man with my sister. I can't imagine where to begin – I search for appropriate code words to use in front of three-year old nieces.

"For the love of god, how did you meet?" Rosalie prompts.

I laugh, relieved.

"In a bar. That place out on Route seven, just before our exit."

"The place_ dad_ liked to hang out?"

I shrug. "I'd just gotten off work and needed a drink, and you know how I don't like to keep liquor in the house."

"You picked him up at dad's bar? A hot man that wears suits?"

"It wasn't like that at all."

I remember glowing eyes and a confident smile. I recall his whispered proposition. I grappled with a condom machine in the bathroom.

"What was it like, then?"

I think back to the moment it changed – almost immediately, with his touch. And then running through the night, the two of us panting and smiling. I remember the kiss.

"Bella?"

I remember the way he looked at me.

"It was like he found me. Finally."

xXxXx

Tonight he traces my scars with his lips, and his tongue, and the flat fronts of his teeth. Under each breast, like underwire burns – he leaves stinging kisses that can never quite make it better. The skin there is numb, but the spaces just above and below are hypersensitive. The smallest touch is like striking a match.

He's the only man, aside from doctors, that's ever seen this. I stood naked in front of him that very first night.

I'd had the odd feeling he already knew.

Then I'd had the feeling he didn't quite care.

Then I understood that he cared quite a bit.

"Were you looking for me?" I ask.

"When?" He parts my boobs and peers over their edge.

"You know."

He sighs. Men don't like to talk when sex is imminent. "I didn't know I was looking until we met."

"Until we kissed," I correct.

"Until we embraced." Edward runs a finger over my ribs, leaving a stinging trail as proof of our chemistry. My chest rises and falls in response. He disappears behind my boob, then he's back. I can't help but laugh.

"Until I saw you." He kisses the corner of my scar. "And felt you." He nips and I could die. "And then afterward, when we finally spoke."

"About jazz?" I wonder as he licks. "When we argued?"

"You disagreed with me so vehemently, even though I'd just made you quiver and shout. Any woman that has the will to change course so quickly and intelligently…" His hands trail downward as if to demonstrate what he'd like to do to that woman.

"I shouted? Your name?" I cringe and feel my face going red.

I'm graced with a self-satisfied smile. _Men_.

"For god, and Jesus, and something about holy fucking. Quite spiritual for a self-confessed agnostic."

"Don't make fun." I playfully smack the side of his head.

"I love you."

"Edward."

"I want you."

"Me too. You, I mean. I want you. Not me."

"I want you forever."

"Edward."

"Say yes?"

xXxXx

Two days have passed away from work. Mr. Newton is dead. I instruct the nurse to start a card from the practice, peel back the veil and go about my day.

"I shit and I sleep, and I work and I shit, and then I have her forcing stuff like this down my throat… And then I shit some more."

Tyler Crowley dangles a large travel cup of thick gray liquid in front of my face.

"The spinach and bee pollen make it gray," his wife explains.

"It's not that bad," Tyler amends apologetically, smiling at his wife. His cheekbones stand out like pale, lonely ridges over the gray gulleys of his face. Nerve damage has left him the disquieting ability to blink just out of synch.

"I get it. That's my life. It is what it is. But I still want to keep it."

"There's some possibility that XelOX -"

"I can't do oxaliplatin again," he interrupts.

"No," his wife agrees, vehemently shaking her head.

They grip hands, united against the chemical.

"It's not worth it." He stares at his feet.

"Okay, then, this is what we'll do." I quietly outline a plan to add a few extra weeks.

"What about green tea?" his wife asks at the end.

"Green tea?"

"It fights cancer, right?"

"If your intestines can tolerate green tea-"

"I can tolerate her shakes," he laughs. "A little tea's not gonna kill me."

"Just think of green tea as icing on the cake, then."

Tyler starts laughing, a quiet chuckle that extends and deepens until he's bent double in his chair. His thin legs shake. Tears run down his face. His wife clutches his hand, confused.

"That's one hell of a cake you're talking about, Doctor."

xXxXx

I open the door and I'm bathed in candlelight. I smell roasting meat in the kitchen.

I get it.

"Hard day at the office?" he asks, sending shivers down my spine.

This is my life.

He greets with a kiss, and large, gentle hands slip around my waist.

It is what it is.

"I love you," I murmur. The words fall from my lips like they've been waiting my whole life to be spoken.

I still want to keep it.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: **

**#1) Sorry if I'm being momrose. **

**#2) Sorry for the BNBD delay. I swear I'm working on it between shifts and life. (This I write during shifts. Don't tell.) I'm hoping to have it out this coming week.**

**#3) Thank you so much for reading & reviewing. **

**Much love, xxx, ~M**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Thanks for reading what I write. Thanks to SereneInNC for stepping in to save me from any more waste. A few notes: This is all one POV. A few people have guessed exactly what's going on. I won't say which people/comments. Much love, ~M**

* * *

><p>"What are you doing, Dr. Swan?" Alice asks.<p>

I laugh and shake my head. It's obvious what I'm doing.

"Chart notes. Orders. Scripts."

My fingers dance over the computer keyboard. My foot's tapping against my chair leg. My tongue's clicking against the roof of my mouth. I realize belatedly that I've been going about my tasks to the rhythm of Def Leppard. I chuckle as I recall the argument Edward and I had last night. He's convinced my taste in music is tragic. I, on the other hand, think eighties hair bands are funny as hell. He doesn't see the humor.

oOoOoOo

_"You can't be serious."_

_"I'm dead serious. I don't simply dislike this cacophony. I loathe it."_

_"You can't."_

_"I absolutely can."_

_I turned up the volume on the stereo before jumping up onto the couch._

_"You know your problem? You need to let loose. Shake it off. Try banging your head."_

_I whipped my hair, jumped and sang._

Love is like a bomb, baby, c'mon get it on  
>Livin' like a lover with a radar phone<br>Lookin' like a tramp, like a video vamp  
>Demolition woman, can I be your man?<p>

_Edward leaned against the doorjamb with arms folded across his chest, shaking his head, pitying me._

Razzle 'n' a dazzle 'n' a flash a little light  
>Television lover, baby, go all night<br>Sometime, anytime, sugar me sweet  
>Little miss ah innocent sugar me, yeah<p>

_I jumped across the couch in Edward's direction, spinning as I went._

_"Dude, have some fun!"_

_"I do have fun."_

_"Listening to _jazz_? Please." I resumed shouting along with Joe Elliot._

Pour some sugar on me  
>Ooh, in the name of love<p>

_In the space of a breath Edward was standing in front of me on the couch, his hands planted against the wall on either side of my head. I stopped shouting, and moving and breathing, even as my body flashed to attention and came alive._

_"Don't tell me how I feel. I do have fun," he rumbled._

Pour your sugar on me  
>Oh, I can't get enough<p>

_"Yeah?" I asked as he leaned in._

_One hand went for my fly as his lips whispered against mine. "Yeah."_

_His body pressed me against the wall. He very obviously liked either Def Leppard or arguing – a lot._

_"You have fun? Show me."_

oOoOoOo

"Maybe I should ask _who_ you're doing, Dr. Swan."

"What?" I glance over my shoulder, having momentarily forgotten my bearings. Alice is grinning like the cat that ate the canary. She kicks her feet out, sending her chair rolling across the office in my direction.

I attempt to regain my focus and concentrate on the computer screen.

"Deny it," she laughs.

"No." The word escapes from my lips of it's own volition.

Alice claps and spins her seat. "I knew it!"

My fingers go back to typing. I'm staring hard. Heat is creeping over my cheeks and across my chest.

"Details?"

"Nope."

Alice sighs. "When Jasper and I first met we never left the bedroom."

Last night Edward and I were on the couch.

"And he was so incredibly sweet. Flowers and jewelry and fancy dinners. Not that he's not sweet now, but when it's new they feel like they have to win you over to earn their way into your pants, you know?"

Edward didn't even buy me a drink to get into my pants.

"So, is this guy sweet?"

"Not exactly."

"No?"

"Um."

"He has you all floaty."

"I'm floaty?" I wonder aloud.

"You're usually the grounded doc, you know? Quiet and intense."

"Edward is intense."

"Edward?"

"Edward," I murmur.

"Jesus. Listen to the way you say it. Wow."

I can no longer type. I close my eyes and images of the night before flood my mind: jeans around my knees, hands pressed against the wall, his hand knotted in my hair and his lips against my neck as he showed me his version of fun.

"Edward," Alice whispers in my ear and I jump in my seat.

"Are you going to see him again? You should. He's obviously good for you. Or just good. Period."

"Alice…"

She wheels back to her side of the office. Before I re-start never-ending electronic paperwork I check the clock. There's only seven more hours until Edward and I can have more fun.

xXxXx

Room three-oh-three.

A weight has lifted. The room is dim, but the air that fills it is light. Ms. Stanley's relatives act as anchors to the living at the corners of the room. Their smiles are perfunctory and tight. Their shoulders are slumped and eyes are heavy. With a polite nod, I turn my focus to the peaceful woman in the bed.

I sigh. She's let go. "She looks at peace."

Relatives nod in my periphery.

Jessica's chest rises and falls unevenly, her lungs now asserting an effortless will of their own.

I hold a wrist and count a speedy pulse. I feel the little life that's retreated inside. Free of her tether, her heart races, burning energy to ether. The heart remembers its primordial flutter. As it goes at the very beginning, it returns at the end.

I observe and honor. I am glad for the ease in the set of her limbs and calm in her face. Skin is sunken, so that her skull nearly glows beneath.

Eyelids flutter, eyes unseeing, opaque and flat. Unintelligible words are whispered from behind the veil. Words I cannot decipher yet.

xXxXx

_Too Late for Love_ plays in the background this time around. Lights are low. I luxuriate in the feels of his limbs twined with mine.

"Seeing you this happy, I might be able to live with Def Leppard," Edward chuckles. We're tangled in sheets, and also around one another. He plays with my hair. I run my nose over a smooth, chiseled pectoral muscle.

"I've known Def Leppard for years. _You_ make me happy."

His arms wraps tighter. "Me and Def Leppard, perhaps."

I shake my head. Hair bands are funny, but I'm being serious.

"You make me so, so… I'm not kidding." I rest elbows on his chest so I can stare into his eyes. "Thank you for this. For us. For picking me up, for coming back. This past month – you've saved me. I might even like jazz with you around."

I'm silenced with a soft kiss. My heart beats against Edward's chest. When he pulls away, I am the glittering reflection in his laughing eyes.

"You'd like jazz? Really? We said we'd be honest."

We had. From the beginning.

oOoOoOo

_Tell me, honestly, are you dying?_

_I kissed him and the world stopped. I swear he stopped breathing._

_We're all dying._

_Are we?_

oOoOoOo

"Okay, I'll never like jazz. Can you live with that?"

My question goes unanswered. I realize my mistake.

"I have this patient, she's right on the cusp. She's balanced on a knife's edge between the living and the dead."

Edward watches me carefully.

"She prayed and believed in her God and yet, right at the end, some of those last conscious moments, I saw the fear in her eyes. It's gone now. They're blank."

"People," Edward murmurs. "They often fear death."

"Of course."

"Why, of course?"

"Either they fear what comes next, or for others, they fear that absolutely nothing will come next," I decide out loud.

"That's silly," Edward murmurs.

"That's human."

"You weren't alive for millions of years before you were conceived. Do you worry over that? Do you fear those millennia? You'll be gone for thousands of years after you die. You are that flash, that spark, you are the embodiment of kinetic energy that will move on when you expire."

"What are you?"

"I am nothing – without you."


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: SereneInNC is my rock... and my beta. Without her, I'd be a fanfic mess.**

* * *

><p>"I have such a hard life, Doctor. So many hardships. You don't know."<p>

Carmen Alvarez is shaking. She is bathed in sweat. The pain medication has yet to completely make its way through her veins.

"And now this, Doctor. I don't know why God does this to me. I don't know why now I have to go. Why this way I have to go."

She rocks and folds herself in half to deal with the pain. Her hand grips mine. I am perched on the edge of her hospital bed. I watch the Dilaudid drip. I estimate two minutes until she is comfortable.

"When I think about you, Ms. Alvarez, I think about what a strong and sweet woman you are."

Lids blink hard and tears trickle from the corners of yellowed eyes. "Thank you, Honey."

"I think about each of your children and what caring, responsible people they are. I can see what a good mother you were to them."

I stop abruptly. I've already put Ms. Alvarez in past tense. If she's noticed, she doesn't take offense. Carmen Alvarez smiles as she shakes and cries.

"I don't want to give up Doctor. But I cannot do this no more. Now, my brain."

Colon cancer has metastasized to her cavernous sinus. Whole brain radiation is in her immediate future. I am not a radiation oncologist, so excuse me when I say that she faces ten days of biding time. Ten days when she'll become weaker and more fatigued and die anyway. It is the standard of care.

It is not my standard of care.

My standard of care is in the space between Ms. Alvarez and I.

Her shaking has subsided. Her grip is slackening.

"Why?" she mumbles. "Why?"

"We don't know," I explain. "We can't. We just know that we want to be proud when we look back. You should be proud."

Her eyelids blink slowly, settling lower.

"Thank you, Doctor."

xXxXx

"I used to hate needles," Edward muses.

I pinch some skin, plunge and sigh. I've grown attached to the sting.

"And now?" I ask, administering insulin.

Edward shrugs. "Indifferent, I suppose."

"Me too," I chuckle, disposing of the sharp in the red plastic container, pulling down my lace camisole.

He takes the box from my hand. "However, I'm not indifferent to the sight of a needle underneath the surface of your skin."

"No big deal."

"Don't make light."

"I'm not."

I stand. I'm tired. The day weighs on me. That little needle was the least of it. Edward places a palm over my abdomen. His eyes radiate concern in forest green.

"We never speak about this."

Air empties from my borrowed lungs like I've been punched in the solar plexus. Seconds skitter past. The tile is cold underneath my feet.

"Are you kidding?" I finally ask. "We've been addressing it constantly since the night we met."

I'm spun, hitched and held in his arms, and for a heartbeat the world spins. When it stops Edward and I are face to face. His breath is cool and his jaw is set.

"We do not speak. About. This. We dance around the subject. Then we fuck and we forget. I watch you sleep, and I'm haunted. And then you're gone."

"I have work."

"I'm offering you forever. You have more consideration for needles."

"You're here because of the needles. Because of lungs. Because of my damned DNA," I argue in a whisper, breathless in this proximity, astounded by the first signs of anger in over a month.

"Don't tell me why I'm here. I'm here because you're found. I'm here because you let me be."

"I love you."

"Then talk to me," he growls.

I brush my lips against his, but get no give, no sigh, and no sign of weakness. I wrap my legs around his waist and press my breasts against his chest. I hold his hair in my hands.

"Goddammit, we need to talk."

I'm pried free and tossed onto the bed like an old coat. Through a flutter of sheets I see him stalking and I shiver.

"Edward."

"We're going to talk."

But he's climbing onto the bed and he's pulling his shirt over his head and kicking off his shoes. I scramble backwards. Dry leaves rustle in the trees and cream curtains billow in the chill air.

"Speak." He holds my ankle. I grab at sheets.

"Edward."

And then he has me by my knee, and then he's tugging satin from hips down thighs.

"Edward."

A belt slips, a fly is undone, and he's above me, and surrounding me and he's tearing away my top and folding his limbs around. I'm having a hard time catching my breath. Hair is pushed behind an ear. His chest vibrates. His lips are at my neck. I am caught in his cage, my heart fluttering frantically, and I'm half afraid my soul's taken flight.

"Speak."

I shake and I remember Ms. Alvarez from this afternoon. I remember the light and grace of this past month. I remember my life reflected in his eyes, like I've only seen it for the first time. It's vivid and beautiful; a song lost on the wind.

The words cut through me from the inside out. "I don't want to give up." Instead of issuing from my mouth it's exploded from my chest. A sob follows, painful and hard, hammering against my ribs. I struggle uselessly, punching, kicking, trying to tear.

"Shh," he hushes, holding my body tighter to his naked flesh. "Shh."

My chest heaves as I cry, but I give up the struggle. His body is my Dilaudid. I close my eyes.

He whispers words to my jugular that have the peculiar ability to flow through my veins. "For now we see through a glass darkly; but then face to face. Now I know in part; but then shall I know even as I also am known… Don't make me guess, Isabella."

He's no longer a prison but a cradle, rocking gently to the sound of the wind, to the syncopated rhythm of internal jazz.

"Tell me."

My hair stroked, my body held, a melody's hummed in a minor key.

"Tell me, my love."

"It was always ending… I was always biding borrowed time," I whimper.

He's quiet. I cling. I feel swallowed up and small.

"Amy Ingersoll. 1986. I watched her slowly die."

Strong arms hug. There's nothing between our souls but skin and secrets.

"A friend?" he whispers in my ear.

"No. She was my older shadow. Week to week she faded, until she was gone."

"She wasn't your future."

"Are you?" I ask.

He pulls away to hold my face in his hands. His eyes are sharp and bright and cry without tears.

"How can you ask? How can you doubt?"

Breath passes too easily through open airways. My chest rises and falls, limited only by Edward's weight.

"Tell me more," he prompts.

"You know the rest. The only certainty is death. _My_ only certainty was death; the dark window at the end of the hall. You've brought desire. You've brought delight. I could spend the rest of my days pinned beneath you, and they'd pass perfectly. Your limbs, your love, your mouth…"

His kiss is soft. He's growing hard.

My fluttering heart steadies and soars. My mind races, trying to keep up.

"This shouldn't be confusing."

"You're uncertain. You're afraid?" he asks anxiously.

"I'm here. I live and I breathe, and I want to live with you, and stay with you. I want the things I never had the courage to desire."

"Marry me."

"What?" I laugh.

He fails to see the humor. His thumb runs over my cheek.

"Marry me."

I shake my head.

"Let me give you all the things you never had the courage to desire."

"Is this a joke?"

"Marry me. Make me the happiest man alive."

"But -"

"You – in a gown, with a veil, walking down an aisle. You would be mine. A band on your finger. A corset around your waist that I would unfasten. A garter, heels, your heart. A smile on your face."

"Marriage."

"Everything you've been afraid to desire."

"I want to fill the space in between. I want to turn the light on in the hall. I want you there."

"Say yes."

* * *

><p><strong>AN: A few thank you's are in order: **

**THANK YOU to everyone that voted for TiaL for Fic of the Year over on TLS. I was rendered speechless for well over an hour last weekend when I found out that it won. I honestly NEVER thought it would win. I still kind of don't believe it. Thank you to all the amazing, lovely ladies over there for putting together such a touching tribute to a story that ended up meaning so much more than I ever thought it could.**

** And THANK YOU to Fiction Freak95, Obsmama Fanfiction & Indie Fic Pimp for the beautiful review of The Veil. Jo shouldn't be allowed to make me cry twice in a week, but I'll take it. **

**xxx, ~M**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Rushed to publish after getting back home, so all mistakes are mine.**

* * *

><p>"Ohmygod."<p>

Edward's arm fits securely around my waist. Rosalie looks from the ring, to my blushing face, to Edward, and back to the ring.

"Holyfuckingshit."

'Rose!" I pull my hand away.

"Congratulations," she smiles, practically vibrating. "I had no idea."

"Me either," I admit.

"Clearly."

Edward chuckles and nuzzles, holding me in his arms. Rosalie swoons. Vivienne does somersaults in a valiant attempt to garner Edward's attention.

"Can I get you two anything?" my sister asks Edward and I.

Edward tends to bring out hidden formality in people. I've been helping myself in her home since I was twelve years old.

"How about a bedroom?" my brother in-law, Emmett, asks as he clomps into the kitchen critically eying our intertwined limbs. He claps Edward on the shoulder. "Set your sights on a doctor, huh?" he chuckles.

"Honey," Rose hisses.

"What?"

My sister shakes her head. "Nothing. Have you seen the ring?"

Emmett glances at my hand, raises his eyebrows and whistles low and long. "Nice one. You two set a date yet?"

A date… For my wedding... To Edward.

My mind reels.

I'm engaged to a man that takes my breath away. I'm engaged to a man that wants to take _me_ away. Somehow, we met in the middle… at marriage.

"I see no reason for a long engagement," Edward offers. He keeps his grip strong and I'm grateful – light-headed, weak in the knees and in love. I'd set my mind on a life lived alone, yet here we are.

"_Marry me."_

I was determined to say no.

"_Marry me."_

I couldn't say no.

"_Marry me."_

I didn't _want_ to say no.

"Can I marry Edward, too?" Vivienne asks.

Edward's grin is bashful, but he playfully winks at my niece, nonetheless.

"Over my dead body," Rose informs.

Plump hands are placed on little hips. "Stop being momrose, Mommy! Please?"

"Spoilsport," I snort.

"You're giving your niece crazy ideas," Rose laughs, shaking her head in mock disdain. She's not chastising. She's happy, bubbling effervescently.

"Crazy ideas? Like following your heart and soul, and marrying for love?" Edward asks. "Like throwing aside fears and taking a leap of faith?"

Rosalie slumps against the counter, drunk on Edward's unabashed profession.

"Like we did, right, Honey?" Emmett asks, placing an arm around his wife's shoulders.

This time it's Rosalie that snorts. "Yeah. Totally."

"So, uh, whadda ya' do, Ed? Besides my sister in-law?"

If I weren't so, well, _floaty_, (to use Alice's adjective), I'd be pissed. I can't bring myself to even feel bothered, though; not as Edward's hand slips lower over my hip, as his thigh suggestively rubs against mine.

"I work in finance," Edward explains. "Nothing flashy: offshore investments, foreign markets. Asia, mostly. It keeps me up nights." By the end, his voice has dropped to a low rumble, the words spoken with lips tickling my neck.

My face ignites, burning as if a match has been struck. A few other things keep Edward up at night. Jazz, lastely.

oOoOo

"_If we're going to be married, I'm going to need compromise."_

_His words caught me by surprise. Married. I'd agreed to be married… to Edward. He looked on expectantly from across the room._

"_Compromise? About?" I asked, pretending I wasn't tingling all over at the thought that he'd be my husband._

_Edward pressed a button on the stereo. "Jazz."_

_I giggled, but my voice hitched in my throat as he stalked across the room. His eyes glowed in the grayness, open and deep, green against green. I couldn't look away._

_Minor chords trembled, whisper-soft and uneven in the night._

_His hand threaded through my hair, holding the back of my head. He was silent, tall, still. _

_More notes came, slow and easy, with a skip and a stutter._

_I smiled. My heart thumped. Edward licked his lips._

"_Your heart doesn't beat in 4:4 time," he murmured as a hand with deft fingers made its way down shirt buttons, opening, exposing my skin to the chill. "It hesitates. It's alive. It swells and beats." His hand came to rest over my heart - which began thumping hard enough that blood pounded against my eardrums._

"_Tell me about heartbeats, Doctor," he asked._

"_Really?"_

_Edward answered with a soft kiss and with hands dipping underneath the lace cup of my bra._

"_There's, um, S1 and S2," I murmured as his lips hovered over mine. "The closing of AV valves, followed by the semilunar."_

"_There's pressure and response," he countered, pressing and pulling at a nipple. Haunting notes bubble hesitantly, popping and bursting, floating and surging. "There's filling and waiting."_

_We were suddenly walking backward without me realizing. And he was slipping and pulling and unhooking until I was naked with nothing but music and air moving against my skin. The melody surged and stopped, building and retreating spasmodically._

"_Tell me about breath sounds," he asked._

"_Breath sounds?"_

"_What I hear when I lay my head between your breasts."_

_Finger pads tickled my sternum, while nipples stood to attention, begging for the same consideration._

"_You hope to hear nothing; just air, in and out. Quiet," I whispered._

_Large hands splayed fingers over my ribs and around my flanks, lifting then setting me on the edge of the bed. He nudged my legs apart, fitting his body between them; spreading his legs and mine with a wide, confident stance. _

"_Lungs and breath are a function of pressure: filling to capacity, then rushing out, until they fill again. An ebb and flow, like the tide."_

_Piano notes fell and faded, then rose, only to subside again._

_He slowly undressed before me. Tie, shirt, then belt, trousers fell, until the very last piece of cotton was discarded. I trembled, exposed, eye level with his erection, but unable to tear my eyes from his._

"_The body waits until that terminal moment, that final up-tick. Its rhythm is syncopated. It coaxes, hesitates, and waits until that very last point, stretching… and then it moves. Like I wait, with painful hope, between each of the beats of your heart and each of the breaths in your lungs."_

_Music drifted like a stroll in the park. A finger ran along my collarbone and traced a path between my breasts. "The music I love is like the rhythm of your body, Bella. I hear it whenever I touch you. I love it. I love you."_

_He climbed over me, hovering, teasing with soft kisses, little nips, with soft brushes of his limbs, pressing without giving, his eyes imploring. Waiting. Hoping._

"_I can compromise."_

oOoOo

I'm brought back to the present with the absence of Edward's touch.

"Much travel in that kind of thing? Emmett is asking as he retreats to the den with a beer.

Edward leaves me with a wry smile as he lets Emmett lead the way toward more manly pursuits. He's enjoying awkward family time.

I fight the urge to run after them. I fight back ridiculously jealous idea that my brother in-law is stealing my time with Edward. I transiently wonder if I have a problem; if I should feel this addicted to another person. I wonder what's come over me, why I've given in. Why I haven't said no and simply gone back to my existence.

Even as I wonder, I know it's impossible. Something has changed. I'm marching forward on a path, finally seeing the beauty on either side. I've found a way to complete my journey.

"Bella."

I startle. Rosalie has planted herself in front of me.

"Yeah?"

"Don't 'yeah' me."

"Um?"

"Tell me!"

I can see that she's barely holding herself back from grabbing my arms and shaking.

"What?" I ask, scooting backwards, wary.

"You really love him, don't you?"

There are tears in her eyes.

"And he is _so_ in love with you. And… and -"

Those tears spill over the brim, down her face. My tough-as-nails sister is sobbing. I pull her into my arms in an attempt to comfort.

xXxXx

There is a soft feel to hospitals in the evening. Superfluous guests offer their goodbyes. Non-essential personnel depart for home. The frills fall away at the same time the lights dim. It is simply the time for living and dying – straightforward things.

I slip into room three-oh-three.

Jessica's chest shudders and stills, then rises and falls quickly, before slowing again. Medical textbooks come to life in my mind as I note the crescendo and decrescendo of Cheyne-Stokes breathing. I feel as though I am seeing through Edward's eyes: the music of the body. I watch with a quickening pulse as the irregular and lilting poetry present at the beginning and end unfolds before me. If I let myself get drawn in, I'd hang anxiously on every halting breath.

She is so close, that I can feel it. Stillness radiates out from her body. Some invisible thread, some indistinct spark keeps Jessica Stanley tethered, though. The thread is fraying. Her soul hovers, ready for the final breath when it will take flight.

She's lived thirty-seven years.

She's leaving behind a little daughter and an ex-husband.

She's all but gone.

I wonder where. What remains?

"Ms. Stanley?"

I touch her cool hand, but there's no reaction. There's hardly a pulse. I feel smooth bones instead. I quickly draw my hand away.

I wonder if her prayers still live in those bones. Does she pray? Is she a prayer?

His voice comes to me, like whispered wind in my ear. _This is the way to start._

_Pater noster, qui es in caelis_

"May her family find solace," I whisper.

_Sanctificetur nomen tuum_

"May her daughter know love."

_Adveniat regnum tuum_

"May she find peace."

With a glance at the set of Jessica's skin, soft over bones, and resting eyes, heavy in their sockets, I know.

I take a deep breath and reach behind the veil, placing my hand firmly over hers this time. I sit in silence, stunned by my first honest prayer, my arm stretched between the living and the dead.

xXxXx

"Are you sure?" I ask across the butcher-block countertop. Edward's obscured by steam.

"About pork chops? Hardly," he chuckles. "But you asked."

"No." I huff, uncertain all over again. Edward's assured me everything will be fine. I'm losing my courage, though.

"Edward?" My voice comes out plaintive and unsteady.

My man goes still.

"Really. Are you sure?" I ask a second time.

I lean on the countertop, emotionally exhausted. Room three-oh-three weighs like a cinder block on my chest. In a breath he's there.

"Sweetheart?"

I can't answer, caught somewhere between certain love and the emptiness of loss.

"Bella? Baby."

"This makes it real."

He tips my chin. His eyes are certain. "What we feel, between us… that piece of your soul that's made it's way underneath my skin. _That _makes it real."

"That first night we were together, I would have said yes. I _did_ say yes."

"You said yes last week." He slides my ring around my finger as a reminder. It's heavy on my hand.

"Edward." I only have to say his name. Of course, he understands. Caught up in our engagement, we've gone back to dancing around the topic.

"Perhaps the precious part of love is the possibility of loss."

"You'd lose me?" I probe.

Those eyes that so often glow go dim.

"Honestly," I implore.

"I can't promise you anything." His voice is clipped. He steps away. I feel his loss, like ice water running down my spine.

"No! That wasn't the deal. That's not what I agreed to."

The doorbell rings. It's time to tell my mother.

* * *

><p>AN: Are you guys getting the picture yet? I hope it's becoming clearer. Like seeing through a veil, they go in and out of focus, but then the picture comes together. Maybe? More concrete answers next chapter. I promise.


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: Many thanks to SereneInNC for being awake at all hours of the night in beta form. I didn't write Feelin' Good. Not sure who did, actually, but man does Nina Simone know how to sing it: http : / / www . youtube . com / watch?v=CJA69C6SlRk. That's the song that's playing at the end.**

* * *

><p>I hide my ring. We ply my mother with wine and pork chops. She smiles, glassy-eyed and eager.<p>

"Mom?"

"Bella?"

Edward reaches across the table for my hand. He's holding my ring in his palm. His eyes meet mine, bright and pleased. The dim distance from earlier in the evening is gone.

"I've asked Bella to be my wife."

My mom sucks in a breath of air so large that I suspect she's pulled every molecule of oxygen from the room. I certainly can't breath, but it may have something to do with the fact that she's flung herself out of her chair and into my arms.

Edward's words echo in my ears._ "I can't promise you anything."_

"I love you," he mouths silently.

I don't know what to think as I belatedly return my mother's hug.

"Oh, Bella, I never dreamed -"

"Neither did I, Mom. Neither did I."

The rest of the evening is a blur. My mother hides her tears and pretends like we can't hear her when she's on the phone with Rosalie in the bathroom. She openly reveres Edward. The wine bottle is forced into double duty as I begin to lean on its contents for support.

"Rosalie wore my wedding dress, but I saved something, Bella. Just in case. And now… You and Edward will come by for family dinner on Sunday. Won't you?"

I've spent a lifetime loathing Sunday family dinners. Everyone in the world who knows about my scars gathers in one place, speaking in veiled references like chronic illness limits one's intelligence when it comes to not-so-subtle subtly and reading between the lines.

Edward checks in with me from across the room. Ironically, he's the one person whose insight has never made me feel helpless.

"Bella may have work."

My mother's face falls. I don't have work and he knows it. This little lie reminds me how much I love him.

"Edward may have work too," I add with a grin.

Sunday night with Edward sounds infinitely better than an evening with the family. He's been hinting at something he'd like to try that involves neckties, Christmas lights, jazz, nudity and my bed.

My mother's eyes are desperate as she looks back and forth between the two of us. I sense new, blossoming fear that Edward might take me away from her completely. As it is, I've lived my entire life with one foot out the door.

"We'll be there, Mom."

She breathes a sigh of relief. "Good. I'll plan something for everyone, then. Edward, what about you? What do you like?"

His eyes are locked with mine, bright enough to burn. With lips barely parted he nips at his lower lip. "Your daughter, Mrs. Swan. I can't get enough of her."

She takes a seat next to Edward, gazing gratefully up at him. He is her hero. He is selfless and handsome. He's taken a stand against her greatest fear.

I need a break and retreat out the back way. I'm not a smoker; I'm not that self-destructive, but desperate times call for desperate measures. The air is cold. The cigarettes hidden underneath the porch steps are stale. I hold the rolled piece of paper and tobacco leaves in a shaky hand.

I haven't possessed much in the way of power in my lifetime. I learned that small, disturbing fact at an early age. Now, Edward's presence has opened up possibilities that I never bothered to hope for. My life has taken an unexpected turn towards the unknown. I am as completely frightened as I feel alive.

I glance up at the dark night sky, glimmering with pinpoints of light. Everything was explainable… until recently. Who can explain the way I feel around that man in my living room? Who can scientifically quantify my reaction when his skin touches mine? When he looks into my eyes? When parts of his body fit inside me? It allows for more than life and death, hard truth and scientific fact, and for the first time in my life, I don't know what to expect.

I make my way back inside, but hold still at the back door as quiet voices drift from the front room.

"I just tried very hard not to anticipate anything," I overhear my mother explaining to Edward. "I learned to live each day to its fullest, and I was blessed over and over again. She's fearless, you know."

"I don't know about that."

"Live every day," my mother advises. "And you'll never be disappointed."

"Disappointed? I found someone I'd like to share my existence with, and she said yes. I'm not worried about disappointment, Mrs. Swan."

xXxXx

I often flinch at the way modern medicine is characterized and promoted: personalized care, familiar smiles, one-on-one attentiveness, and individualized plans. The truth is that you never want to be the one they remember.

Hundreds of nondescript women pass through my office every year: mastectomy, chemotherapy, radiation, and finally hormones. Hundreds are alive five years later. Hundreds live. Hundreds of middle aged men walk in with elevated PSA's, and leave minus a prostate or plus some radioactive seeds. Hundreds live a decent life, with some sildenafil in their pockets for insurance.

You don't want to be the one they remember.

I will always remember the cheerful, vacant hope in Mrs. Crowley's eyes as she brushed past me on the stairwell Wednesday afternoon. "We're going back home so he can get stronger." I'll never see her again.

I will always remember Mrs. Newton's notebook filled with hopeful medical predictions that found it's way to our office a week after he'd passed on.

I will always remember Jessica Stanley's daughter dancing in the hospital hallway while she died.

xXxXx

"How are you today, Bella?"

"You tell me, Doc," I laugh. It's our longstanding joke. Today I actually find the humor in it.

We smile like old friends as Doctor Webber unwinds his stethoscope and hangs it from his neck.

"How's the belly?" he asks.

"No complaints."

"Is this tender?"

He doesn't wait for an answer. My wince is his clue.

"How's my liver?" I ask impatiently.

Doctor Webber raises an eyebrow. He knows me well, as do the lab techs back at the hospital. I'm well aware that my liver enzymes have been holding steady this past month. My bilirubin's elevated, but it's also unchanged. I try to quell the irrational hope that this is the magical effect of love – of having another person to live for. I want to believe that this is what Edward can do for me.

"You tell me, Doctor," he says with a grin.

"You know I don't go as far as imaging."

"Because you know that it's unlikely to show anything at this stage."

I breathe a sigh of relief at the small gift of still qualifying as " at this stage".

"Any heartburn?" he asks.

I shake my head.

"Bruising?"

"Nope."

"Hematemesis?"

I shake my head again. My hopes rise swiftly and ridiculously, like a helium balloon launching from my heart.

"Melena?"

"Not this month, Doctor Webber."

"That smile?"

"Excuse me?"

"And what about that twinkle in your eyes?" he asks with a grin.

"Doctor Webber!"

"Doctor Swan," he chuckles as he offers his hand to help me to a sitting position. "You look well."

"Well, I've, uh…I'm, um, engaged," I murmur. The words do funny things to my face. My cheeks feel hot and tight.

Doctor Webber is still clasping my hand in his. "My most sincere congratulations, Bella. It's a delight to see you smile."

xXxXx

Edward finds me in the bedroom seated at the vanity. With just the sight of his reflection in the mirror, my body burns, my limbs ache, my skin tingles to life.

"You look pleased."

"If ridiculously turned on passes for pleased," I admit, ducking my head, peeking through the hair that's tumbled in front of my face and over my breasts.

His self-confident smile makes me shiver.

"Have you eaten?"

I shake my head. "I'm not hungry. Have _you_ eaten?" I ask.

"You know what I want," he murmurs

Invisible hooks tug at the corners of my mouth. "You've been talking about it for days."

"You exaggerate."

I shrug, trying for nonchalance. My heart is hammering. I stand and smooth my silk slip, exposed and eager. "Maybe I've been hearing your thoughts."

"Then you'd know what you've done to me."

He absently presses a button on the stereo before loosening his tie and making his way to my side of the room. A woman moans. Brass and bass make the floorboards beneath me vibrate.

"Take off the slip."

"Say please," I tease as I pull my hair into a quick ponytail.

Straps are torn like tissue paper and silk slips lower, suspended only by taut nipples.

"Please," he whispers in my ear. A gentle tug and it falls to the floor.

I'm acutely aware of his proximity, of the swish and swirl of the air as his body moves without quite touching mine, and the fabric that still lies between us. I can tell by the commanding look in his eyes, though, that now is not the time for me to make a move to unclothe.

"Do you trust me?" he asks, as a single finger trails from my shoulder, over the swell of my breast, and then skims ribs one by one.

I blink. My vocal cords feel frozen.

"Close your eyes and listen to what you've done to me. Please."

_It's a new dawn_

_It's a new day_

_It's a new life for me_

"Trust me," Edward implores.

I nod my head.

"On the bed. On your back."

"Edward."

"Shh." Cool breath sweeps. A finger is pressed against my lips. "Listen to what you've done. Listen to the way you make my insides soar."

_And this old world_

_Is a new world_

_And a bold world_

_For me_

His fingertips press against my shoulders and I shuffle backward. His lips press against the delicate spot just behind my ear. "On your back. Eyes closed."

With every small move I make, I feel he's just beyond my sense of touch. I feel the air move instead of his limbs. I feel the bass shudder against the walls.

"You're so beautiful, Bella." He kisses my ring. "Are you really ready to be mine?"

I nod.

_Stars when you shine you know how I feel_

"Do you trust me?"

"I -"

I'm silenced by the subtle rustling of fabric.

"Do you love me?" he asks, with lips against mine.

"Yes," I murmur catching his mouth with my own. I'm gifted with seconds of give and take, lips and tongue, the slide of teeth against tender flesh.

"Then trust me," he says, dragging lips along my jaw.

_Freedom is mine_

_And I know how I feel_

Gentle and swift my wrists are held together and stretched over my head.

"I cherish you. I worship you."

Silk winds, firmly tied. Rough finger pads skim over the sensitive skin on the undersides of my arms. Lips brush over nipples. Thighs are nudged apart.

I ache. I arch my back. I hold my breath. I listen.

_It's a new dawn_

_It's a new day_

_It's a new life_

_For me_

"Edward?"

A cord, cool and thin with pinpoints of warmth is wound around my ankles and softly clatters against the footboard, then falls over a leg, circles my breast, and skims against my scars.

"My love. My light. Do you trust me?" he implores.

"Yes."

Edward's relief is palpable.

"Thank god."

A nip beneath my breast is swift and smarting, followed quickly by a lick and a soft kiss. Hands gently part inner thighs, and his lips and teeth tease where I'm most sensitive. A woman moans ecstatically in a voice full of pain.

I stretch and flex, aching from the inside out.

"Don't struggle. I have you."

Another kiss brushes against my thigh.

"And I'll hold you."

And he's working his way back up my body.

"In sickness and in health."

Large hands flare out over my scars. His erection weighs heavy against my abdomen.

"For richer and richer. We'll never be poor."

I giggle and feel his body: long and hard, lowering until we're flush.

"As long as we both shall live," he speaks soft and solemn, his nose brushing against mine.

"And after that?" I ask, opening my eyes. I'm startled. We glow, entwined with soft little lights.

He unties my arms, massages my muscles and I'm finally able to embrace.

"I don't know the answer to that, yet. All I ask is for your trust."

I feel him pressing and I angle my hips.

"There's no one else, Edward. Of course."

* * *

><p><strong>AN: To the ones I remember: BB, JK, JC, RG, LSI, JA, KJ **


	8. Chapter 8

"So, um, when?" Rosalie asks, looking between Edward and me, jumping in her seat with excitement. All eyes, except Vivienne's, are on us. My niece is studying the meatball on top of her spaghetti.

"Uh, I don't know, exactly."

"As soon as she'll let me."

My mom whimpers, I think. The sound is muffled, so I can't be certain.

I sigh as a large foot rubs against mine underneath the table. As long as I have Edward for support, I'll be fine.

"Where?" Rose continues the interrogation.

"Where we first… _met_," Edward murmurs.

Our eyes meet. He's so cool and collected and… stealthily filthy. I shiver.

"Dad's bar?" Rose scoffs. Emmett guffaws. Mom looks sincerely concerned for the first time this evening.

Of course, Edward isn't referring to dad's favorite bar. "Met" is a euphemism, of sorts. He's speaking in the biblical sense of the word while holding me hostage with his green gaze. My mind goes reeling into the recent past…

oOoOo

"_Let me buy you another."_

"_You better," I chided, blotting up the spilled shot with my cocktail napkin._

_I couldn't help but notice that the tall, not-so-dark, and handsome stranger that just spilled my drink seemed a tad too smug after such a clumsy move. Not to mention that with his impeccably tailored dark suit and a watch that must have cost more than my car, he was completely out of place. _

"_Do you come here often?" he asked, leaning in, probably getting his sleeves sticky on the tabletop. He was dead serious, too; seemingly unaware that he'd just delivered the mother of cheesy pick-up lines. _

_Surprisingly, though, I felt compelled to answer. "Um, no. This is my dad's old hang out."_

_The man's composure crumbled before my eyes as he glanced nervously around the tiny dive. "Is he here?"_

"_No, but he's close. He's out back, behind the parking lot."_

_I waited for the information to register. This guy was quick; it took just a heartbeat for him to understand. He was obviously well dressed, stunningly handsome _and_ smart. _

"_Oh, uh, I'm so sorry. My condolences." _

_And, apparently, he was sympathetic. And he was close enough for me to smell. And he was completely intent on me, like I was the most interesting thing in the universe. And he was tall… and neat… and clean… and wealthy… and when he stared at me like I was his whole world, it managed to take my breath away._

"_What are you doing here?" I couldn't help but ask._

"_I needed a drink." He offered a cocky, crooked smile, reveling in some personal inside joke. _

"_Me too," I replied. _

_I nodded to his drink. The bronze liquid had gone untouched and unspilled. His finger ran around the rim of the glass in lazy circles._

"_You didn't find anything you like?"_

_He bent his head to mine so that he was just a whisper away. "I have now."_

_I tried to ignore the shiver that worked its way up from my toes._

"_Dude."_

"_Dude?" he asked, with another laughing, winning, dizzying smile. _

"_I don't fall for insincere pick-up lines."_

"_And I don't offer insincere pick-up lines. I would sincerely like strip you bare, suckle at your breast and fuck you raw."_

oOoOo

"Will you wear a big, long married dress with a choo-choo train on the back?"

"What?" I wonder, caught off guard.

"A choo-choo! Chug-a-chug-a!" Vivienne laughs.

"Just a train, Vivie," Rose titters as she sips at her wine.

Right, I'm at Sunday night dinner with the family.

"Knowing Bell, she'll totally wear something brown and 'earthy'," Emmett makes air quotes and chuckles.

"She's beautiful in brown." Edward's speaking of my brown silk sheets, of course. He likes the way they bring out the blush in my nipples.

"And as for earthy…" his voice fades. His eyelids fall to half-mast. I recall earth embedded underneath my fingernails and grass tangled in messy hair. I remember Edward gasping, "_I can't_."

oOoOo

"_What did you do?" I'd murmured, high and happy, floating on fire._

"_I don't fucking know. But we must do it again. Immediately."_

oOoOo

"She won't wear brown burlap! I won't let her." Rose actually bangs her fist on the table. I'm startled back to the present.

"No, brown hemp," Emmett laughs.

My mother looks on pleasantly. I could probably get married in my birthday suit and she'd be happy as a clam – as long as Edward said "I do".

"Will you wear a choo-choo, Auntie Bella?"

"No, Vivienne. No train."

My niece's face falls.

"I think it'll be something simple and silvery-white."

I surprise myself with this admonition. I can actually picture it all in my mind. I know what I'd like to wear when I marry Edward. He clasps my hand. We smile at one another, ridiculously pleased.

This is love.

"And where did you two, um… meet?" my mother asks meekly.

"There's a pasture just beyond the cemetery on Route seven. There's an old gazebo and a small barn on the property. Prairie roses are tangled with ivy."

"Huh," Mom muses.

"You can't just get married in somebody's field, though," Emmett argues.

"You certainly can – if you're the person who owns it."

Of course he does.

xXxXx

"Since when do you own the field where we first fucked?" I wonder as I lay in Edward's arms later that night. He traces a finger lazily over the peak of my breast, back and forth, pausing to twirl around my hardening nipple.

"Fucked? Is that what we did?" He quirks an eyebrow. He adds a thumb to forefinger. He's a nipple tease.

"Where we '_met'_?" I challenge.

"What would you have had me say? Where I made you mine?"

"That's…"

Edward finally pinches and pulls, stopping me in mid-protest. I gasp and wriggle.

"It's the unequivocal truth." His eyes burn brightly, bringing me back to that first moon-soaked evening we spent together.

"Did you know what you were doing that night?" I ask, climbing astride, holding his head in my hands.

"I knew I wanted to taste you more than I'd ever desired another woman. I wanted to fill you." He grabs my ass and bucks. "I wanted to pound you."

I struggle a bit for purchase on slippery sheets. I press my thighs and slip myself over his length. His eyes flicker, and in a blink they've gone from hot to a more subtle warmth. He brushes his nose against mine.

"You say you wanted to pound, but you were so careful, so sweet and gentle when you pulled my sweater down."

"Well, by then we'd touched. You were, _we_ were… different."

He cups my face and I can't help but lean into his touch. We are different. We are alight. We are the only thing that matters in this moment.

I brush my lips against his, half-surprised I don't see sparks in the dark.

"We'd kissed," I murmur.

It was the best kiss of my life. I'd lost track of all sense of time and place, not to mention body and mind. I was lost in an insular world of insistent lips and probing tongues and a hard body pinning me to a rough wood shingled wall. It began desperately, nearly violent, and ended soft and breathless. He took my face in his hands and held his breath as his eyes probed mine. I still can't be certain my feet touched the ground.

"And I knew you were special," Edward recalls quietly, brushing my hair from my face. "Precious."

oOoOo

"_Are you dying?" he'd asked._

"_We're all dying."_

"_Tell me."_

_It clicked._

"_You know," I'd whispered._

oOoOo

"The first time you wrapped your lips around my nipple I just about died."

"I bit." He grins at the memory.

"And it felt so good. And then you tugged my sweater all the way down around my waist, so my arms were kind of pinned to my side… and you saw."

I remember so clearly his sharp intake of breath and the way his eyes went wide. He ever so gently traced a path underneath each breast before lifting me onto his lap. Tipping me back, he licked at the corner of the scar, right over a rib.

He knew.

His hands grasped my waist, strong yet gentle.

How did he know?

"Are you ready?" he'd asked.

I'd wondered that very question my entire life. I'd struggled to attain acceptance. I'd searched for peace. There, in the cold, half naked and alone with a stranger, I finally found the certainty just beyond my grasp.

"I am."

And with a thrust and a tear my world changed forever.

"No," Edward answers. "I didn't know what I was doing. I thought this kind of thing was a fairy tale. A story told to make the nights more bearable. You're my fairytale come true, Bella. How could I ever let you go?"

* * *

><p><strong>AN: This chapter was unbeta'd, but SereneInNC doesn't go unloved, that's for sure. Thanks so much to all that voted for this little story for Fic of the Week! THANK YOU for reading and reviewing and putting up with my (apparent) 8 day update schedule. (How inconvenient!) Until next Wednesday, maybe? LOVE~BDC**


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N: Inspiration for the beginning? http : / www . youtube . com/watch?v=TYEeAOTIQ2c&feature=related**

* * *

><p>How do you measure happiness? In yards of silk? In borrowed bridal veils of Venetian lace? In the perfect corset and stockings? In flower petals in buttery yellow and creamy white?<p>

I never thought I'd measure joy in jazz, but Edward has accomplished the impossible. I'm not listening to Billy Idol, but Ella Fitzgerald. I'm not exactly a little lost lamb like the song implies, but I am handing over my heart. I'm motivated by foundless trust born on nothing but a feeling.

We've waited for moonlight, starshine and the first bloom of crocuses and tulips fresh from the earth. We've kept things simple and small, only inviting my immediate family and my officemate, and Edward's older brother who's flown in from Russia for the unlikely occasion.

My mother handles her hand-me-down veil with shaking hands. It's impossibly delicate, older than my soul, as precious as my love.

"Your grandmother began the embroidery for this the day I met your father. She said she knew he was the one by the feel of his smile. Maybe she was right. Your father wasn't normally a smiler."

"That's not how I remember him."

"You were different, Bella. He always smiled at you. He said it was 'of the utmost importance'."

"He smiled at you when you weren't looking. I thought it was our secret."

My mother's eyes are bright and wet. "The first time I met Edward, I knew. The way he looks at you…"

"He loves me."

"And my tough little girl, look at you."

With a glance in the mirror, I do as my mother suggests. Pink cheeks brighten a sallow face, bright brown eyes radiate a contented glow. My formfitting gown is simple and silvery-white with a wide neck and a slim skirt that shows off my skinny curves. The veil is aged and doesn't match the wedding white or the delicate petals of my wildflower bouquet. It's a bit stiff and heavy, but it's my birthright. I wouldn't think of meeting Edward without it.

"Daddy would have wanted to see this day," I murmur. My father was over the moon when Rosalie got hitched to Emmett, but he couldn't look at me for a second that Saturday so long ago.

"Maybe he _can_see you."

Ideas of that nature always leave me angry. Today is no exception. There is no room for make-believe on my wedding day.

"Dad's gone, Mom. He doesn't see anything and he doesn't hover over us."

Mom's face crumbles and she suddenly busies herself with her corsage. I've made a habit of speaking to her like this because death has always been mine to wield as I see fit. It's unfair and I'm instantly ashamed.

"I'm sorry," I murmur.

Mom nearly hides her hurt. "I should have raised you to be a better Christian. No heaven, no church, no priest."

"We have a Justice of the Peace."

Mom purses her lips, loathe to say anything more derogatory on my wedding day. I want to make this right.

"Lately, Mom, I've been praying."

She shakes her head, a silent plea to stop playing with her faith.

"For my patients, I mean. I don't know about them, but the hope… it helps me more than I would have guessed."

My mother is still, almost like she's trying not to frighten a small animal in the forest. "Is this Edward's influence?"

"Sometimes life calls for prayer."

xXxXx

We stand in a semicircle. My family holds hands. A tall, blonde stranger, Edward's brother, seems absently bemused. I don't care. The man I love can't take his eyes off of me. His body gives away his nerves. I see it in the way he clenches his fists and in his bitten bottom lip.

My father isn't present to lift the veil. There were options and potential stand-ins, but this is a symbol unique to Edward and I. Anyone else would be interfering.

He stands before me, grave, yet determined.

"For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face. Now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known," he murmurs. As he lifts the veil, his face comes into focus: pale and chiseled, eyes bright and intent on loving me. It takes willpower I didn't know I possess to keep from cupping his cheek and going on tiptoe to offer my lips.

"My god," he whispers, tucking the veil behind my ears. "I never -"

"I love you."

"Perhaps we should begin," the officiant interjects. Emmett chuckles. Vivienne dances in a circle. Edward doesn't appear to notice. He's drinking me in, standing straighter, glowing, smiling.

_"We have come here this evening to witness the wedding of Edward Anthony Masen and Isabella Marie Swan."_

The evening is ours: the stars, the cool breeze, and the flowers at our feet. I feel that the world suddenly exists for me; it's here to please my senses and offer a home. I feel happiness. I know pleasure. I have all of this now that Edward has brought me to life.

_"The legal requirements of this state having been fulfilled, the license for their marriage being present, and each party present of their own free will and accord, all that is left are their vows."_

Edward's eyes blink almost as if he would cry. "I love you," he mouths before speaking out loud the words he's carefully chosen.

"I vow to give you everything you've ever been afraid to desire," he murmurs, his hands reaching to clasp mine. I've anticipated this vow, but it makes my heart ache even so.

"I vow to love you always," I reply.

"Is that a promise?"

This is a sincere question on Edward's part, not the scripted words we've discussed beforehand.

I squeeze his hands. "_Somehow_, I'll love you forever. I swear it."

He takes a step closer. "I vow to hold you to that."

"What about you?" I ask.

"You know that I'll love you through eternity, Bella."

"But you said that real love embraced loss."

"Perhaps love conquers loss. Love opens possibilities one hadn't considered."

The officiant clears his throat. Edward and I are startled into silence.

"Maybe you two don't need me. It seems like you could do this on your own."

"We have. On this very spot." Edward offers a wry smile. His eyes twinkle. My cheeks warm over.

"Excuse me?"

"I'm sorry," I apologize. "We won't interrupt again. I want to marry this man. Immediately."

"Which, of course, is why we are here…"

The world is still while we exchange 'I do's'. Time slides to a halt. We are bound. Edward is mine. I am in his arms and I am promised peace there for as long as we both shall live.

xXxXx

The family toasts with champagne in the little graying gazebo aglow with twinkling lights. It's chilly, but my sister has furnished heat lamps, which we huddle underneath in clusters. Edward holds me close. His lips are at my neck. There is a new tension in his limbs and it has nothing to do with nerves.

"That was a weird wedding," my niece whispers loudly into my mother's ear.

Someone muffles a guffaw. She is hushed.

"But it was not like Cinderella's wedding!" Vivienne protests.

"Yeah, well, Cinder_bella_does things a little differently than most," Emmett laughs, placing a brotherly kiss on the top of my head.

Arms tighten. A chest expands. The air around me shakes. It's all over in a second though, and the world as I know it returns. Emmett backs away with a skeptical smile.

"Will you be staying long?" my mother asks Edward's older brother.

"Blink and I'll be gone."

Vivienne blinks dramatically. "You didn't go anywhere, Carlisle!"

The tall man laughs. Edward excuses himself and takes his brother aside.

"Some fine genes in that family," Alice says, ogling the figures receding in the night. "Congratulations, Bella."

She offers a hug, then stands back and grasps my hands. "Everyone should be so happy. So lucky."

"Now I can relax," Mom sighs, kissing my cheek. "My life's work is done. Congratulations, baby." Before Edward this sentiment would have struck me as the height of anti-feminism. Tonight I see her point.

Rose holds Vivienne, and Emmett wraps his arms around his two girls. For once, my family brings comfort instead of awkward monitoring and devastating expectations. My eyes burn and the night goes blurry.

"You'll ruin your make-up," Rose warns.

"Don't cry, Auntie!" Vivienne wriggles out of her mother's hold. She rushes and wraps her chubby arms around my knees. My mom miraculously produces a handkerchief and Alice dabs at my eyes.

I spot Edward striding back to the warm glow of the gazebo. Tears stream freely, handkerchief be damned.

"If Edward makes you sad I'll beat him up!" Vivienne announces.

With a swoop, she's held aloft. "If I make Bella sad, if I ever hurt her, I'll let you beat me up, Vivienne. Promise."

oOoOo

_"Did I hurt you?"_

_"What are-?"_

_"Are you hurt?"_

_"No, but -"_

_"Promise me. Be honest," he begged._

_"What? I mean, I am... honest."_

_His hands ran roughly over skin and fabric, searching out the spot, tangling with cotton, pulling at elastic._

_"Christ, I almost can't believe… Let me see you."_

_"What?"_

_"You. Now. In the moonlight. I need to see."_

_I scooted backwards, acutely aware of the contrast between the cool breeze and the heat that had grown between us – the same heat that coursed underneath my skin, that seared somewhere between the tenth and twelfth rib. I had questions. I felt electric. His eyes were alight with anxious need. There was blood on my fingertips. I'd been so sure he was going to kill me._

_"Let me see you."_

_He'd already seen the weakness and the past. He'd revered my scars. He'd made me see stars. I was certain he'd set me on fire. I was still there. Breathing, heart-beating, awake to the night._

_I stood, with a sweater stretched around my waist and a broken bra cradling emptiness, with no panties and a dirty skirt. You'd think he was gazing at heaven instead of my insignificant and disheveled form._

_"I need you to be honest," I instructed._

_"Always." His answer came quickly and felt misplaced for a one-night-stand-cum-murder._

_I swiftly pulled my sweater down over my hips and held my breasts in my hands. My bra dangled around my waist._

_"I need to see all of you."_

_"Then be honest. You knew," I accused, then hold my breath._

_"I knew." _

_I dropped my hands and air whistled through his teeth. I fondled my skirt's zipper. "How?"_

_"It's what I do."_

_The skirt was unzipped. It's cotton slipped through my fingers. I was bare before him._

_"You do… _this_ often? Honestly."_

_"Never. No, not like this. You're standing. You're stunning. You're, fuck, tell me honestly, are you dying?"_

_"We're all dying."_

_"Are we?"_

_He was on his knees before me, his hands over my ribs, over the spot where it stung. His green eyes were bright. His fingertips burned. The world fell away._

_"Do it again?" I asked._

_"You never have to die."_

oOoOo

"Did you ever think you'd get married?" I ask. Nose to nose, chest to chest, breathing out, breathing in.

We lay naked and tangled with the sheets. We've been together like this for twenty-four hours without interruption.

"Perhaps once, a long time ago."

"Really?" This wasn't the answer I'd expected. I'd certainly never counted on marriage.

"I suppose as a boy I considered it de rigueur."

I giggle. "I wish I could have seen you as a boy… thinking something was _de rigueur_."

"I wish I could have seen you as a girl, to tell you nothing was de rigueur. To tell you that the future could change." Sadness seeps into the room, under the door, into the bed. I won't have it.

"I wouldn't change a thing, Edward. Everything I lived through brought me to you."

"I love you, Bella Swan."

"I believe it."

"You love me back."

"I do."

He rolls me on top of him, plays with my hair and peppers soft kisses. His smile is priceless. I think I see the shadow of the boy in him. There's nothing but light and innocence in his eyes. He's in love with a girl that he's married.

This is so simple. This is life. I am so lucky.

xXxXx

I took seven days: seven days of sleeping and waking and laughing and loving. Seven days of breakfast in bed and dinner on the bedroom floorboards by candlelight. Seven days of stories.

_"Her name was Tanya. She cornered me in a stable and threatened me. Kiss her or I'd have a mouth full of manure."_

_"Tommy McDermott. My best friend's big brother. I was sleeping over at Maureen's house and I woke up to his lips and his tongue and beer-breath and a hand on my boob. In the morning he pretended it never happened."_

Seven days later I go back to work. The truth: it was hard to stay away. The hospital is my old place of comfort. There is calm in the order of life and death. I am the island that this rising tide of life surges around. People come and go and I witness. I never waver.

Lauren Mallory clings to me with one thin hand and clutches the lip of the counter with the other. Her frail limbs and weakened heart strain to keep her body upright. Steady, she lets go of my shoulder and begins applying blush with a shaking hand. She is leaving. She's cleared for transport home. This is a medically questionable decision.

"I've placed orders for you to return in one week."

I won't see her again.

"Yes, doctor."

"Wound care will be in before discharge."

Her necrotizing pelvic mass will need vigilant attention.

"Yes, doctor."

Pale pink now stands out on delicate, yellowed skin. The veil cannot hide the anxiety in her big brown eyes. She didn't think she would get home.

"What are you doing up, Baby?"

Mr. Mallory rushes to Lauren's side.

"Make-up. To leave," she breathlessly explains.

He laughs with tears in his eyes. "Don't you know how beautiful you are? Don't waste energy on this nonsense. Save every ounce. You need every ounce."

With a strong hug and a sigh, she's borne to the bed and propped up with pillows, her stick-thin legs tucked beneath a blanket. With a kiss to her forehead and Lauren's promise to stay put, he resumes packing up the hospital room and moving belongings to their car.

"I'm afraid for him," she whispers once he's left the room.

"He's strong," I assure.

"_We _are strong. I don't know what he is without me."

"You've made him strong." I grasp her hand. I want these words to work.

She smiles. I can't ignore her nervous eyes or the thin film that separates the two of us. She has days left, perhaps a week. What is a week compared to the twenty-eight years she's lived? How does she measure the happiness they can hold?

"Doctor?"

"Yes?"

I blink back tears. Marriage has made me soft. I do not cry in patients' presence.

"I want… can I… please…" Her words trail off as she leans in.

I take a seat. "Lauren?"

"I want to have sex again before I die."

Her eyes settle on mine, steady and serious. The veil is gone. This is the dying wish of a woman rotting from the inside out.

Her husband walks into the room and I watch how Lauren's presence draws him to her side. He doesn't want to miss a minute of what is left. She reaches for his hand, but continues to look into my eyes.

I need to go home. I need Edward's waiting embrace. I am suddenly staggered by the loss that's beating against my shores. My island has turned to a pile of sand, slammed by waves, thrown by the tide, lost in the wind.

We are human, we love and then we lose. I've loved and I will lose. How will I do this?

"Doctor?"

_Right._

I choose my words carefully. I speak plainly about pillow-bolsters and lubricant, about fragile bones and friable skin. I am awarded with grateful eyes, simultaneously soft and brave. With handshakes, hugs and a wheelchair, they are gone.

I leave the office early. Happiness is measured in minutes, and they fly faster than you know.

xXxXx

The house is dark. Edward usually leaves a light burning. Usually I can feel his presence. Tonight though, there is tension in the unmoving air.

I practically run from the car, hungry for his touch. I don't know how I ever agreed to become so close to another person, to share my heart and my life. At the same time, after only one day at work, I can't bear the pain of separation. Only his skin can calm the anxious, icy feeling threatening to still my heart. Only his steady gaze can dull the pain and make sense of this turmoil.

"Edward? Edward! Are you home?"

There's movement in the dark. I stumble forward, but I'm met by a pair of piercing blue eyes instead of green. A tall, blonde half-stranger steps from the shadows.

"Carlisle?"

His smile grows slow and slippery, like an oil slick across his face. "Bella."

The back door clicks shut. Footsteps echo, drawing near, but neither of us moves. I can't be sure I breathe. Edward appears in the kitchen doorway. I've waited all afternoon for his arms, but as he takes his place next to his brother, something keeps my body at bay.

"Carlisle was just leaving."

"Edward? I, um, didn't know your brother was still in town."

"And here I was waiting for an invitation to tea." Carlisle takes a leisurely step in my direction, but Edward grabs hold of his brother's arm.

"Carlisle was leaving."

"She's lovely, Edward."

"Out."

"So, this is what's become of your morality?" He casts a skeptical eye around my home.

"Out!"

"You know what you're doing, don't you? Does she, though? Does this little wisp of blood and bone know what's in store?"

"Edward?" I ask, backing up, feeling for the wall to hold myself upright.

"Get the fuck out of our home, Carlisle!"

"Your home? How quaint. But I think you'd have more respect for the older brother that's given you everything: your life… some semblance of peace."

Edward swallows. His form wavers, almost if he were a little less than flesh.

"You have nothing to say to that, do you?" Carlisle asks, taking advantage of momentary weakness. "You invited me here. What were you expecting?"

"To share in my happiness." Edward's voice is quiet. He seeks me out, sadly apologetic.

Carlisle shakes off his brother, and he's by my side, peering down.

"I don't believe you're interested in sharing… your _happiness_, in the least, little brother."

"Get the fuck out!"

They are both there, next to me. The air shakes like it did on my wedding night, to a deep bass that I can just barely hear. I cannot move. I cannot shake.

"And then what, Edward? Where does this charade end?"

"This charade is the only real thing I've ever known. I need you to leave."

Carlisle laughs. The sound plays havoc with my heart.

"So fucking sweet. Let me leave you to your world of gumdrops and lollipops and little fucking candy hearts. I don't want you to blink and miss it all.

"Goodbye, Carlisle."

"Sooner rather than later, Edward."

I blink and he's gone.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Thank you to SereneInNC for beta'ing at a moment's notice. Thank you to Troublefollows1017 for pre-reading from Switzerland (so freaking cool - right?) Thank you all for your patience, your reviews & your love. XXX ~ bdc**


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N: SereneInNC has been with me almost a year. I am so freaking lucky to have her as a beta in my life. **

* * *

><p>Edward is there to catch me as I slide to the floor. He is there to hold me when my heart begins beating.<p>

"He'll never touch you."

I haven't regained the ability to speak.

"We'll prove him wrong."

He holds on tightly and rocks in the front foyer. Wind rattles the windowpanes. A clock ticks on the mantle, randomly splicing space into time. Stars rotate in the night sky as the Earth continues its path around the sun. He holds and rocks and eventually I stop shaking, and then his form comes into focus.

I don't have to ask.

"He doesn't think I can keep you," he explains, pushing the hair from my eyes.

"Keep me? I'm not your pet. I'm your wife."

"Then he doesn't think I can let you go."

"I'm never letting you go, Edward."

He holds my face in his hands. His bright eyes radiate equal parts power and fear. "You want to die."

I take his hands in mine. "I just want you. I want a life with you. A good life."

"And afterwards?"

"We die. Why did you bring that _thing _here?"

"He was the only person I could bring. He's the only person I could confess my feelings to. He's the only person I could turn to for support. I don't care how you couch the terms; you want to die. That's your decision, so you're at peace. How am I supposed to go through each and every day knowing that's your wish? How am I supposed to let you slip from my grasp?"

His cool confidence evaporates before my eyes. He searches my eyes desperately, asking the same question I struggled with all afternoon. He asks how he will bear the impossible. Each and every one of us faces this at the end. It is not a challenge I have ever grappled with before. It simply is. We are born. We die. We leave others behind.

"Will you hold me?" I ask.

"Forever."

"Tonight, please?"

xXxXx

We both cling as the darkness invades. His hands explore my swells and dips without pause and I realize that he's committing my form to memory. His nose stays buried in the crook of my neck. I cannot tell if he breathes or quietly sobs and I can't bring myself to ask. He knew. He always knew.

"You wanted to take my life," I whisper. "Your brother wants the same. This can't be a surprise."

"He'll never be back. He's leaving it to me."

"_It_? Two little letters represent my existence?"

"Your life is the most significant thing I have ever known. Your life is a miracle."

"All lives are miracles." Each day at the hospital I am charged with watching over these miracles. Every day I am left to judge which miracle is fading and which can flicker on. I am so small in comparison to all of it.

"But I don't feel this way about everyone, just the woman I hold in my arms each night. Yours is the only pulse, the only heart, the only pair of lungs, and lips, and eyes. You are what makes my existence make sense. Without you…"

I place a hand flat against his chest "Keep me in your heart, Edward."

"It's only because you're here that I know I have one."

"We don't have to worry about this now. There's time."

"What is time? It's already over."

I push his hands away and scramble to my knees.

"I am here, Edward! I am right here! Don't you ever take this: the two of us together, don't you dare take this away. This is what brought me back from giving up. This is what made me want to live my life! You gave me the strength to experience this. You gave me happiness and hope. Do _not _pretend it's not real. Do not pretend it's already over!"

In one swift motion Edward is on his knees in front of me, his hands on my hips.

"I would give you everything."

"You and me and the small space that lies between. _That _is everything."

He folds me into his arms and in his careful embrace I begin to feel peace for the first time all day. I recall the simple words I'd spoken plainly to Lauren as he lowers me to the bed and lifts my hips. I hear instructions about fragile bones as he finds a way inside.

"Tell me I'll have you always."

His words echo to the rhythm of his hips.

"Tell me I'll never lose you."

He grows bolder. His body becomes more insistent. His eyes glow and his lips glisten.

"Tell me you are mine."

Piercing pleasure mixes with pain. He can no longer speak. His body is rigid; his fingers will leave marks. I love him enough that I would die in this moment and would not look back with regret.

I will not look back. I cannot regret.

**EPOV**

I watch her while she sleeps. Soft and warm, blood and bones; how can something so fragile contain my heart? It is a mystery that I can barely brush the surface of.

The planets pause while I wait for her next breath. The universe falls in on itself between heartbeats. Our first night together, the world faded and flickered as she fainted in my arms. Now, with every breath, I'm uncertain of the future, but it's a delicate torture I can no longer exist without.

She is death.

She is rebirth.

She is hope that all is not lost.

Only moments or months ago she was something as simple as a "two for one", the kind of find that would make a mouth water and a dick stand erect. She was the kind that burned brightest near the end, with a pair of tits that would turn the most timid men into predators. I am not timid.

I do not take no for an answer. I never have to.

I walk through the world and I take what I want. Regret is unbecoming, so I take what will soon expire. She was a spark, a sputter of flame. She was delightful in death. She held allure that I'd never known.

When I touched her hand, when I took her lips, air filled my lungs and my chest rose and fell. She shouldn't have mattered, but she did, and I worked to preserve her until the very last moment. When I sat her on my cock, my chest half exploded and my head filled with light.

"Are you ready?"

Her eyes met mine, dark and deep, and the death inside was something I'd never seen in another living creature. She knew me.

"I am," she pronounced with inhuman acceptance, and the earth seemed to shake and the sky fell away and I wanted her more than anything I could remember desiring since the dawn of time.

With a bite, my heart filled and my limbs came to life. She was wonder and light, she was more than energy and a fuck. She was an end to lonely nights and meaning for my days. She was everything and nothing and the mystery that lies between.

"I can't."

xXxXx

If I'd killed her I would never have known this torture.

I brush her hair from her face. I cover her quaking body with a sheet and climb underneath next to her. I cannot leave. I cannot let her go. I will betray her in the end and it hurts as much as it holds promise.

I never believed I would find meaning in another. Carlisle spoke of such circumstances with derision.

_"We are selfish, so we take. We are selfish, so we keep. We do as we see fit. We are gods among men."_

_"There was another, once. She spoke of the light she found in a shared heart," I argued._

_"Katrina spoke of her reason for revenge. The name that fell from her lips never existed. Let her stories keep you company as you walk the earth, but don't let them hamper your world."_

I would not let her fade. I would hold her on high. But she has death in her eyes and peace in her heart. She asks the impossible with such longing that I half hope I can offer her every desire, even in our mutual demise.

Underneath the sheets, her scent surrounds and I am safe in a moment that I try to extend. The universe quivers and bends to my will for a breath.

"I can't lose you," I murmur. She is skin and bones. "I cannot lose what is most precious. I cannot lose the only thing I've ever cared for." In her sleep she settles against my chest. She is too warm. Her heart beats too fast. Her blood will overpower her veins.

Her small hands hold tight with the promise to let me go in the end. Each night spent together is fraught with indescribable pleasure and insufferable pain. To bear this duality is human; to rise above it - divine.

xXxXx

We sit on her sister's couch and Bella holds court. She has each member of her family in thrall. She believes it is because she is dying, but it is her ineffable life's force that pulls them in. We should all be so fearless and frank.

"We took him off support, but he's holding on. They sit day after day and wait and watch. You can feel their sorrow in the air."

Rosalie shakes her head and presses her lips together. This talk makes her uncomfortable and she begins clearing the coffee table.

"There's some states where that wouldn't be a problem," Emmett offers.

"Well, I think that's disgusting," Rosalie grumbles. "Emmett, are you going to sit there and talk like some undertaker, or help with this mess?"

"It's good that the man in the hospital isn't died," Bella's niece decides as she climbs onto my wife's lap and offers a hug. "It's because you're a good doctor."

I watch Bella check for the location of her sister and brother-in-law. They are safely out of earshot, but she lowers her voice nevertheless.

"Sometimes, Viv, people have to die."

My presence is proof of this fact, but I sit still and stay out of it.

"Why?" Vivienne asks.

"Because eventually bodies stop working and life drains away, and it hurts to stay alive."

"I'm not hurt."

"No, you are full of life and potential," she says, cupping her niece's plump cheek.

"Edward, are you hurting?" Vivienne asks.

Of course, I am always in pain. "No, Vivienne. I'm not hurting." The little girl sighs with relief.

"And you, Auntie Bella?"

"Just the littlest bit, Vivvie."

Vivienne wraps her arms around Bella's neck and holds on tight. "I don't want you to die, Auntie Bella. Only if you have to."

Bella's eyes meet mine. They are wet and I am glad.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Thank you all so much for reading and sticking with this little fic... I'm sorry if my writing here is too vague. The fact of the matter is, while Bella is dying of a specific disease, I don't think the specifics matter so much. Similarly, while Edward is something not quite human, I don't know that the specifics exactly matter. Honestly, in this fic, I don't know that he would give himself a name. Vamp? Death? Demi-god? **

**The important parts are the parts about life and death. The idea of losing your life, the idea of watching others die, the idea of watching loved ones disappear. It's something so simple, really. It's a part of every single person's journey, but in this society it's largely ignored or spoken of in whispers. Thank you for taking the time to think about these things with me, and in a light that's not tragic, but poetic. I really do think things are somewhat beautiful at the beginning and the end, and that so many people simply forget to live well in between. xxx~M**


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N: My apologies for the delay in posting. Vacation + work = poor fanfiction punctuality. SereneInNC ... what can I say? Thank you. In case you're interested, I listened to this on repeat while writing: http : / / www . youtube . com/watch?v=nI56fiyre8E**

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><p>Alice and I bask in sunshine as we sit on the picnic tabletop out back behind the hospital. After weeks of rain, spring has made a dazzling reappearance. Bilious white clouds float across a sea of deep blue. Sunshine warms the surface of my skin at the same time a brisk breeze manages to make my hair stand on end.<p>

Alice sighs, leans back and closes her eyes. "Mr. Jenks is on his way home."

"That was a long time coming, huh?" I ask.

Alice has been butting heads and locking horns with a taciturn man dying of esophageal cancer. He was twice as tall as Alice and ten times angrier, and he had a habit of looming over her threateningly while he swayed unsteadily on his feet. His scowl grew as his upper limbs went spindly, his legs filled with water and his skin turned gray.

"He lodged a complaint about me with the administration."

"It won't stick."

A smile hovers about Alice's lips. "It'll probably go down on my permanent record."

"I wouldn't worry."

A cloud passes over the sun and I shiver. These days I am increasingly sensitive to the cold. Spring blooms around me yet I still prefer to wrap myself in thick blankets and Edward's arms at night. I've taken to closing the windows and turning up the heat, which tends to drive Edward out back in search of fresh air.

The silence Alice and I have fallen into is interrupted by a noisy flock of geese that descends, taking over the strip of grass across the back parking lot. I watch as they industriously go to work on the grass, pared off two by two.

"Hey, Bella?" Alice asks, her eyes intent on the geese.

"Yeah?"

"I didn't like Mr. Jenks."

"No one liked Mr. Jenks."

"Someone did once. He has kids."

"That doesn't necessarily mean he was liked, just sexually active once upon a time."

Alice bites her lip. It fleetingly reminds me of Edward and I try to quell a shudder that works its way from the inside out. I cross my legs and wrap my arms around myself. My white coat taps against my leg, flustered and fluttering in the cool breeze.

"Do you ever feel bad when you don't like them?" she asks quietly. "Do you feel bad when you're glad you'll never see them again?"

My eyes sting and I tell myself it's because of the pollen on the wind.

"I guess I just treat them like people. Some people you love, some you hate, but they're people either way."

"Mr. Jenks was definitely a person."

"He was."

If I were Mr. Jenks, I'd want attendees at my funeral to talk about how I was a stubborn old man who only grew more taciturn with age. I'd want them to recount how I fought my disease the only way I knew how: with anger and contempt, so that I was as difficult with others as the cancer was with me.

I am not Mr. Jenks, though. I don't know what they'll say about me. I hope they'll talk plainly: I've mostly kept to myself. I tried not to burden others, and maybe that was unfair to all involved. It kept up a wall between me and the world. It left me open to one thing: death, and I skipped everything in the middle… Until, of course, a man picked me up in a bar and fucked me silly, scared me nearly to death and fell in love.

Across the parking lot, one errant goose comes too close to a pair. Tempers flare, and with honking and an angry flap of wings and stomping of webbed feet, the single bird is driven across the ground. The other geese make room for battle, looking on dispassionately between bites of grass.

"You know, you can stop losing weight now," Alice says offhandedly with a nudge of her elbow. "The wedding's over."

"Um, yeah."

"You're too skinny."

"You're too short."

The victorious goose waddles back toward his mate, feathers ruffled, holding his head high. He has sunshine, green grass and the warmth of a female goose for his reward.

"Do you think geese would mate for life if they lived forever?" I wonder out loud.

Alice giggles. "Are you serious?"

I shrug.

"If geese lived forever, the world would be covered in goose shit."

"Come on," I laugh.

"An hour ago you're talking mTORs and renal cell carcinoma and now you want to discuss immortal geese?"

"Immortal anything," I insist. "I mean, look at any of those devoted couples that cling to one another when they walk into the office, completely unwilling to let go. Would they feel the same about each other one hundred years from now?"

"I don't know what you're talking about, Bella. What do geese know about death? For them, they _are_ together forever. They're alive, and they find that mate, and that's the end of the story. What do we know about death? Those people that are still in love after fifty years, they _are_ in love forever. Death doesn't change it. The only difference between us and the geese is the length of our forevers."

xXxXx

"… portacaval shunt… splenectomy… nine years in some studies of pediatric patients… unlikelihood of another successful transplant…"

There is no joking in Doctor Webber's office today. His smile is sad and determined, and it frequently flees the small room. I'm relieved that I left Edward at home. There is no doubt he would have also fled, most likely with me in his arms.

"This turn of events is unexpectedly rapid, but in cases such as yours -"

"I'm lucky." I laugh bitterly. Doctor Webber flinches. I am the embodiment of his success. I am his pride and his failure wrapped in one. I am the one he will remember.

"Ursodeoxycholic acid preserved your liver as long as possible."

"You preserved my liver as long as possible," I assure attempting a sincere smile.

"You have some time to think this through."

As if I have done anything else since I was six years old.

"Well, if I have a choice, I'd rather go out with a massive, unprecedented infection," I confess. "Cirrhosis isn't a romantic way to die. And don't even get me started on esophageal varices or obstruction." I try to smile and make light, but Doctor Webber calmly holds my gaze. The truth lies in his eyes and I settle down and meet it head on.

"Splenectomy is my best option." My voice sounds hollow in my ears. It seems to echo in the office.

"I'm sure there's nothing I could tell you that you don't already know."

He holds my hand and I surprise myself by clutching back. I know this visit well. This is the one where you move from the living to the other group of patients – the group slowly marching toward the window at the end of the hall. If I had cancer I would be offered palliative care or salvage chemotherapy. I wonder what Doctor Webber calls my options.

I look in his eyes and I don't have the heart to ask such a question. He doesn't want me to go. His eyes are wet. He has failed.

"I appreciate everything you've done, Doctor. I couldn't have done this without you."

"What? Sit in my office?" he asks.

"Live. They prepped me to die, and you helped me to live."

xXxXx

**EPOV**

Hours pass like instances, days like sparkling grains of sand. Time is measured in shades of skin gone yellow, growing incrementally darker and more severe. I am filled with something that I struggle too long to give name to. I discover what it feels like to despair. The only meaning I find in my existence is time spent with Bella. Left alone, I contemplate her permanent loss. My existence is reduced to worthless wandering by her ephemeral human existence.

Desperation drives me to search out the answers Carlisle failed to provide.

There is one other in the world besides Carlisle, so old and wretched that I do not recognize myself in her. Carlisle asked if Bella knew what was happening, yet it dawns on me how little I truly understand. I know that she moves my heart and lungs, I know that her blood is my balm and I hold her together with my heat.

Yet it is unraveling day by day, second by second. Seasons pass in the blink of an eye and I watch weathering mountains to pass the time, but with each missing ounce of flesh and each new bruise, I am shaken to the core. I dare not close my eyes.

"I have to travel to Iceland on business."

If she's surprised to hear about this while I'm between her thighs, she doesn't let on.

"Investments?" she asks with a gasp as I move, as the earth tilts, as I watch the life slipping and surging through her fragile veins.

"You're the only thing I'm invested in." My finger traces her jugular, bumping with her blood. From her neck it dips deep within. Another day, another body, I'd aim for its source and devour. Now I am impudent. I love gently, infinitely and with reverence. I am no longer recognizable.

Bella and I both need this knowledge. I cannot stand by and observe as she slips like water through my fingers.

"Business," I repeat. "Urgent business."

I fuck. I hold her in my hands. I cannot close my eyes. She melts beneath me. I will make her say yes, one way or the other.

"When?"

"I want you. There. With me." I finish with insistent fingers and teeth and the full force of my hips. Lightening burns from the inside out, and I hold tight with the pain of life moving heart and lungs. Humans can take more than I'd ever bargained for. I can hardly stand the potency of our fused bodies. How is it she hasn't shattered?

She pants, catches her breath and glistens, grinning with eyes closed. I kiss damp skin and taste the sourness of jaundice. I work to make time suspend itself. I'm granted a half-second and I take it greedily. In that moment I was gifted with golden brown hair fluttering across a pert nipple flecked with blood.

"I don't know about Iceland. I have -"

I close my mouth over hers. She loses her train of thought. She loses the regular rate and rhythm of her heart. She loses herself as I devour and trap. She should be no match for me, but she should also be my equal. She is better. She is made for this.

"Don't say you have work," I implore, my lips moving against hers, my hand between her thighs. "You have me. You could _always_ have me." The flash of pain in Bella's big eyes holds me in check. We do not linger long on that line of thought. "When can you get away?"

"I don't know."

"Please find out immediately. Come."

With lips searching for her salt and fingers finding the sweet spot deep within, I make certain she does just that on command. Then I fold her into myself, wrapping limbs around, tangled in her damp and warmth, vowing to find answers, committing her scent to memory.

"Always, Bella. Always mine. My heart and my life. No matter. No matter."

xXxXx

At work, she is not mine. She belongs to the dead, like I belong to the dead. Of course, she is gentle where I would strike, but it is very nearly the only difference. She is self assured and calm. She is a master of death and I am indelibly owned.

"It's not fair. I'm fifty-five. This shouldn't be it," a woman cries.

"It isn't fair." Bella is being honest. She feels it.

Her fingers close over the hand of the woman charged with death, both being eaten from the inside out. Her patient would taste bitter, like dirt and nails. An unlikely breath and she will be gone.

"But this isn't _it_. You are more than cancer. Your life is more," Bella insists.

"It's all I do, though: appointments, pills, how I eat and sleep and how much water I drink. I think about it when I shit."

"Then stop."

"Stop?"

"Stop. Take two weeks. Eat, sleep, shit, play with your grandchildren. This is not what you are."

"Is it… safe?"

She is dying. She is not safe.

Bella's eyes convey this information and her patient accepts. I have done this. I lead helpless women to their end.

"Call if anything comes up. Don't hesitate. Otherwise, take back your life."

Bella talks of life while she sentences with death. She hugs the dying woman. She holds hands. She commands the office staff and signs paperwork. She wipes her eyes. She rocks in her leather chair and quietly cries.

She will come with me to Iceland. Her death will end my world.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Thank you for reading and for each of your reviews. Much love until next time, xxx ~bdc**


	12. Chapter 12

**BPOV**

My mother isn't happy with my travel plans and her displeasure is evident in her tight lips and guarded silence. My sister isn't one to hold back, though.

"This is wrong."

"It's a week."

Rose glares.

"Nine days," I quietly amend.

"I've liked _him_ up until now, Bell. He's been good for you. But he doesn't get to take you away from us. Not now."

"What's so important about now, exactly?"

I want to see if she'll say it.

"He doesn't get to take you when you're… _sick_." Even as she takes the dare, she speaks in a whisper, like a soft voice will keep my condition a secret from the Grim Reaper ready to swoop in and carry me away. Whispers or not, I'm going.

"You've all had me for thirty-four years," I quietly remind Rose, wiping sudden tears from my eyes.

She shakes her head and purses her lips determined not to give in to softer emotions. "You never let us _have_ you, you know. You always kept yourself apart; you never really let us in. And just when I got a glimpse, just when I saw something, I don't know, human-"

Edward appears in the doorway and my sister quickly retreats to her bedroom instead of completing her thought. My silent mother sniffs before kissing me on the forehead.

"Keep her safe," she softly requests as she squeezes Edward's hand. "And keep in touch. And please, promise to bring her home intact for us."

Edward watches me carefully as he takes my mother in his arms. I've seen what's left at fault lines after earthquakes have rent the world in two. What I see in Edward's eyes is worse.

xXxXx

**EPOV**

We leave for islands younger than my years. We leave for green fields that lay deceptive and peaceful over hotbeds of lava and pressurized gas, and crystal blue waters battering jagged gray shores. We leave holding brochures decorated with picturesque villages in the slanting sunlight, beneath fjords and beyond waterfalls. We leave her family and their concern, and their censure, and their grief. I take her away from everyone she knows and loves. After countless human lives, it is the first time I care, and it shreds my heart with each desperate beat.

I hold her small, sallow hand and try to find reassurance in her eyes; instead I see myself onboard a commercial aircraft. If only absurdity could take away the pain I would be free.

"How much time will you need for your investments?" she asks, the corner of her mouth upturned in mirth.

I cradle her thin face. "I need forever, but I'll take what I can get."

Her face lights and her eyes soften. "As long as we have some time left over to see The Blue Lagoon and Hallgrimskirka and Gullfoss, and just hang out underneath their crazy unsetting sun." Bella pulls out a guidebook she'd stowed in the crook of her seat, but I pluck it from her hands and tuck it into the seatback, out of the way.

"You don't want me to see the sights?" She laughs and playfully reaches for the missive. I clutch her hand and draw her as close as I dare in the present of strangers. My lips brush against her ear and my fingers trace the gentle slope of her neck.

"Actually, I want to take you slowly in a steaming geothermal pool on a retreating glacier as your bare breasts glimmer with the reflection of the Northern Lights."

She swallows and shivers. "Um, okay."

Her smile is self-conscious and her cheeks are warm and pink as I draw away and survey. Her body is tense with anticipation. Her thighs brush against one another, her fingers fiddle with the hem of her top. The predator within is pleased, but I am warm and alive and this moment means more to me than blood. She is my bride, and I speak of a promise: to move inside her until we're both spent, gasping and swearing, certain we know more of the heavens and our hearts. She'll giggle and try to tickle and make me smile. I'll find ridiculous pleasure in the feel of her soft and salty skin against my lips. I'll whisper words I don't know yet. I'll hold her close to my chest and pretend I'll never have to let her go.

"What is it?" she asks. "Edward?"

My name on her lips and I am undone. She makes me forget who I am. She's somehow found the human inside and it's killing me as surely as it's killing her.

"I love you."

Three simple words can make a star fall from the sky.

Her eyes are wet.

"Don't go," I plead.

She wipes at her face and I catch the tears. There are shadows underneath her eyes.

"I'm yours. I swear." Her whisper is warm on my face.

"It's not enough."

"This life is never enough, Edward. That's true love, right?"

"No. That's not my love. And that's _your_ life," I counter.

"The one you vowed to share."

"Every second. Every breath."

I wrap her in my arms. She's taught me to cry.

xXxXx

I leave Bella lost in sleep with a note bearing a promise that I'll return. I cannot pretend at folly. We are here for solace and the truth, and it lies waiting on Iceland's great interior plateau. It doesn't take me long to find Katrina. I am repelled by her stench, but use it as my guide to a gritty boarding house on the edge of the sand fields.

Her door is unlatched, her room unguarded, and when I enter she lays unmoving in the weak light of the northern sun. She is disjointed bones and papery skin. She is teeth and a skull and wisps of silver hair. Her eyes are hungry and empty, the color of the never-ending dirt fields that extend to the horizon. She has forgone the formality of clothing. She is dust and a voice.

I hold back my impulse to stomp and destroy.

She flies across the room and dull, scratchy fingers claw at my chest.

"It's true. It's true. It's true."

How do you speak to a wraith? How do you hold back your will to end disgusting misery? How do you face a visceral reminder of a fall so precipitous and contemptuous that you want to obliterate it from existence? I do it because I can do everything. I do it because my will is unyielding in all matters, except those related to … my... my… to Bella. I do it because underneath Katrina's tissue-thin skin and tendrils of hair there beats a heart, alive like mine. It's hollow pumping booms in my ears and shakes the boards beneath my feet.

Tears wet my cheeks. She has a living heart and her eyes are pools of unending sorrow that mirror my own.

"It's true. It's true. It's true."

The shrill words reverberate in the glacial air. I don't know what language she speaks; I simply understand.

I collapse in a chair and she is everywhere. She is more air than form. Light falls through the spaces between her ribs. She awakens dust motes from surfaces and the mist falls and outlines her frame.

She stares into my unblinking eyes. "So young. So lost."

"The stories were true, then?" I ask. "Carlisle denied it."

"Carlisle doesn't know. You know. You are warm and alive before me. It is true."

With small popping cracks, her brittle fingers stretch over my chest. She lays a scratchy ear against my neck. She straddles my lap and I throw her across the room. She hits the wall and lands in a pile on the sagging bed.

"It is true," she sings.

I stare straight through her dull eyes to the world beyond. I don't know what is left inside of her skull and I'm loathe to destroy her to find out – although it is a pure impulse. She is shame embodied - grief and despair. She is the worst of all worlds. She is loss.

"I'm here to learn. To listen," I explain to the polar breeze that rushes through her bones, speaking my purpose out loud.

Her smile is chilling. "And god came down and fell in love with the world. And the world died. What is a god to a dead world? My world was Aeneas. His love was my light. What is the name of yours? We are a dream. We are dead. You and I are dead."

"She's afraid of what I have to offer."

"She should be. Take her anyway."

"She asks me not to."

"At the end. At the brink. When that light flares finally then dims, when her life flickers before you like a pretty little fire. Bring her back. This world needs a replacement for me, for you will surely end what you see here when you're questions are answered."

"She asks me not to, Wraith."

Katrina is in front of me, large and fierce and older than the ocean, her form very much corporeal. Her sudden strength shakes the walls. "It is not her choice."

An instant and she is a small pile of bones at my feet. "It is your choice." Her voice is small. It is pity slinking across the floor.

I stand and nudge her away with my foot. "I came for my answers. Your existence is your own."

"You don't need me for your answer, Edward. You knew the moment you spared her life. You knew what she was to you. You knew exactly what you felt and you liked it."

"Don't tell me what I liked!"

She is against the wall. I am pinning down air.

"Do not talk of her, Katrina! She is not something I like. She is stronger and brighter and bigger and she is my -"

"Everything. Your dying world."

The words come to me from the sky and I let Katrina drop to the floor and grab at the tattered curtains for support. The fabric tears between my fingers and I'm left holding dirty shreds fluttering in the stale wind.

Her voice circulates in the thin air around me. "Love. Funny something so strong goes by words so simple: Agape. Amare. Ahava. Humans wrangle and wriggle and ascribe it to small woodland creatures. They are born and they die and they never know that they possess such power. Tell her. And take her. _Thy _will be done."

"She made her choice long ago, Katrina."

"If you won't tell her, then I -"

"No!"

But she is gone.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: **

**Where have I been?** Working hard & dealing with loss. Sorry for the delay

**Where is this story going?** Sorry if you feel it's just gotten too strange. It was always intended to go this way. It's really just a look at love, at death, and at spirituality and human existence.

**How much longer?** Probably two chapters. Maybe three.

**Will this ever be complete?** Yes. Promise.

Much love & thanks for all of the check-ins & inquiries and wishes and prayers. xxx, bdc


	13. Chapter 13

**A/N: Many thanks are in order: to SereneInNC - my long suffering beta, to Rochelle Walker for turning me onto Psalm 139:7-8, to my hubby who gave me a child-free afternoon, and of course to my patient readers. Thanks so much!**

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><p><strong>BPOV<strong>

I wake to grayness and Edward's absence. I wake to an empty feeling in my chest and a dull pain in my abdomen. I blink and a wall of glass reveals the city of Reyjkavik glittering against a pale orange midnight sky. Another day, another month and I'd immediately bounce out of bed and get ready to explore, but I'm tired and the city will wait. I am warm, wrapped in a comforter, and Edward's scent lingers on the pillow. I tell myself that it's what's holding me down, when my foundering will and declining health is more than half to blame.

I hum and hope he won't be too long. The lilting melody warms me from the inside out.

"_What's that?" I'd asked as we'd settled into the expansive hotel bed after our flight. The pitch and rhythm falling from his lips seemed to come from the night - to ebb and flow to something secret I was only just uncovering. _

"_It is you. It's how you make my insides move."_

I fell asleep to the gentle rumble of a syncopated melody deep in Edward's throat. Hours later, it's still with me, even though his body isn't. It's the way I make his insides move.

I close my eyes and press my nose against the pillow where he'd laid his head. I let his scent fill the lungs inside my chest and I listen to my heart beating against the mattress. I take solace in the fact that my heart pushes his scent through blood vessels – bathing each cell of my body in his essence. I clutch at the comforter and try to recreate the contours of his body. I feel needy and lost. I feel grateful and guilty. I let down my guard and broke my rule, now I'm leaving someone behind. I thought he was a dream, yet his reality is all the more frightening.

The one thing I've always been certain of is death. The one thing I've completely embraced is my end – everyone's end. It is right. It is the journey we are given when we are gifted with life. Human existence is not an Icelandic polar night - unending and monotonous – both beautiful and frightening. Our life is a package, a journey, a walk down a path with the destination clear.

I can't fathom an alternative.

xXxXx

"_What are you?" _

_It had taken all my courage to ask. At first I'd simply assumed he was a handsome madman. It didn't take long to see that I'd been wrong, but I didn't want the dream to end, so I waited and enjoyed his body. I savored his words and adoring eyes. He'd come back to the bar the next night, and the night after that, and the night after that, and so had I._

_After a week I took him home and he lingered on the step, suddenly shy._

"_Please… come inside."_

_His face lit with a smile, and he took my body in his large hands. He carried me over the threshold like we'd traded vows instead of a one-week stand that brought broken skin, an insane proposal, and fit of sudden desire so feverish that I couldn't stay away._

"_What are you?"_

_He ignored the question._

"_What are you?" I repeated, taking his face in my hands, watching his burning eyes for some indication, some clue._

"_Edward," he muttered._

"_And what, exactly, is an… Edward?"_

"_A man who gladly spends his nights with a Bella," he murmured with a chuckle and a half-smile._

"_Seriously?"_

"_Am I not here? With you? Gladly, madly, night after night?"_

"_I mean, you're a… man?"_

_He guided my hand lower. "I think my gender is quite apparent. If you're unsure, perhaps you should part those pretty lips so I can drive the point home."_

_I rolled my eyes, and, well, straddled his lap. _

"_Edward," I pled, trying to will the truth out of his pores, if not from his lips._

_He pushed himself against me, like hearing me say his name made him want me more. _

"_I don't doubt your…" I wrapped my fingers, "… masculinity. Or your desire. But what about this?" I ran a hand over my most recent scar and trembled. Exposing myself was still very new. "And this?" I held out my wrist. "Don't get me wrong. I mean, I like being with you."_

"_Like?" His eyebrows rose in question, a bit of a snug smile on his face. _

"_Really like," I amended._

"_Well, I fucking love burying myself deep within you."_

_And with a swift flip and roll and a pull on my thighs he was ready and aiming to do just that. I placed my palms on his chest. I knew he cared enough to stop if I was unwilling. My hips begged me to let them tilt and position, but I stayed strong and I held him hovering above me._

"_Not until you tell me exactly what kind of man are you, Edward." With a shimmy and a wriggle I gave the barest brush – a hint of what was waiting if he answered._

_His hands rested on either side of my head and he crouched over me so that all I could see was the bright green of his eyes. My world was cast in shadow. The room had gone cold and dark. A small white light shined from over his shoulder._

_I shivered. _

"_Tell me."_

"_Humans have no name that comes close. They mislabel my kind as various monsters. Those names are not worth your consideration. I am the darkness at the end of your day. I drink your life and bring your death. I am the cold promise of your mortal coil. But you, my most precious find… you are a tether in the form of light and breath and air and bone. I am nothing compared to you."_

xXxXx

Even after those words, I'd let him take me – holding my head in his hands, my legs wrapped around his waist, his breath at my throat, the burn, the sting, the way I could feel him everywhere and forever.

Perhaps it was _because_ of those words that I let him stay. He was solace after a long day of work and a life overshadowed by illness. He was separate from everything and everyone I knew. He wasn't small or insignificant enough to hurt when I would go. He made me laugh when he spoke of marriage. He made me feel normal and special when I saw that his words and promises rang true. And then _he_ came true – he loved me and I loved him back.

My eyes sting and I scurry from the bed hoping to shake the loss that's filled my chest. His loss, mine, ours. I go in search of my bag and my meds and instead I spot a small rectangular silhouette leaning up against the glass wall.

_Shout at the Devil_ is queued to play on a tiny silver iPod.

I laugh out loud as I pick up a small cream-colored piece of paper lying on the floor next to it.

**I 've taken enough from you without taking your passion for heavy metal. Make sure that you enjoy yourself in my absence and I'll make certain you enjoy yourself on my return. **

**~Edward**

I couldn't wipe the smile off my face if I tried as I scroll through the playlist he's made for me. He's done his homework and I have a veritable 'best of the eighties heavy metal hits' at my fingertips. It seems like so long ago when we'd laughingly fight about and then fuck to the tune of hard rock hair bands. Those were the days when he'd ask me to stay with him forever and I could quiet him with a kiss and a clutch as he held me against a wall.

These, however, are the days when he whisks me to Iceland with fear in his eyes. These days he makes sure I pack broad-spectrum antibiotics and these days I notice the care he takes when he climbs over me in bed.

"Edward," I whisper as if I could beckon him back to the hotel. Each day with him is a gift and I'm greedy for more. Each day with him hurts. Each day I see his carefully guarded pain. But if he's true and real, he'll continue on after I'm gone, right?

"_Surely you cannot doubt his love."_

The words are unspoken, yet they dance through my mind as cold air seeps slowly from beneath my feet, rising in the room, somehow smothering. I pull my robe tighter. I breathe deeply and my throat feels like it's closing.

The words come again, waiting for an answer._ "Surely, you cannot doubt his love."_

Of course I can't. Edward loves in this intense and otherwordly way. He loves without reservation.

"_He loves. Absolutely_."

I shiver. He does. I see it in his eyes as he utters the words at climax. "_I love you_." I hear his voice and see his sincerity almost as if he's before me.

"_He will love you forever."_

I think about Edward: his signature smug smile juxtaposed with tender eyes. I see the bravado in his step and the care in the brush of his fingertips. I watch desperation build from somewhere inside his chest and rise like a tide to fill the room.

I am frantic and search for my cell. He must come back because I'm obviously losing my mind. I suddenly notice the glass walls have frosted over. I see my breath before my face. My feet slip on a frozen floor.

"_How can you condemn him forever?"_

"Forever is a story!" I find myself shouting. "Forever isn't human!"

"_You made him flesh."_

The coldness rises and swirls and I struggle with my robe, suddenly suffocating. Tearing, pulling, my robe falls to the floor along with the iPod and _Love Song_ by Tesla blares from the tiny instrument.

"_Don't you believe in your own love?"_

"Of course, I…"

"_Don't you believe in him?"_

I fall to my knees, shivering, nearly naked and warm tears burn my cheeks. "Until _death_ do us part! Death! He wanted me dead!"

"_You are dooming your love."_

"No!" I plead with the voice in my head. "No."

The door crashes open and heavy footsteps rush in my direction. "Isabella, are you hurt?"

"_Choose life."_

"Edward?"

He pulls me to my feet and I stand before him trying to decipher the wild look on his face. He's dirty and his hair is a mess, his suit is covered in dust and his hands tremble as they run over my arms.

"_Embrace."_

I do as the voice says and pull him to me. I hear the rush of air escape his lips. I feel his heart pound in counterpoint with mine. His presence fights the chill in the air. His hands hunger to hold me.

"Please, are you alright, Bella?"

"_Feel what you do to him. Feel his heart."_

My hands move over the grit on his dirt-streaked chest. His hands find my face. He makes me look into his eyes.

"Are you hurt?"

I shake my head in the negative but words won't come. I kiss him with hands over his heart. I feel my own chest try to explode.

"_Let her feel your heart. Move the cloth."_

"Are you hurt?" he whispers against my lips.

I fumble with buttons, prying his shirt open, straining to bare his chest. He is warm. His chest thumps. I'm pulling, tearing – I've never needed skin against skin as badly as I do in this moment.

There is a cold beat in the air around us. I feel as if Edward and I are inside a vortex.

Jeff Keith wails from the iPod, "_Keep an open heart_… _Love is all around you"_

"You found my gift."

Edward's smug smile is back and it brightens the room.

"I missed you."

His fingers pull the straps of my nightgown from my shoulders. His hands find my breasts then slip to my scars, tracing a path along the ridges of my ribs.

"_Feel his lungs. Feel his life. Feel yourself underneath his skin and inside his veins." _

I bring my lips to his chest and wrap my arms around. His pulse quickens and his body stiffens. Pressed against him, I can feel how he wants me and I go to drop to my knees, but he holds me and lifts, placing me on the smooth tabletop – a tall stand meant to hold a vase of flowers or a phone - or a slowly dying woman.

His eyes are as hungry as the air is cold. We both tug at what is left covering one another's skin and I climb to my knees on the table. He grabs, holding my ass in his hands and lifts. I wrap a leg around, his breath hitches against my neck, and with one self-assured thrust his cock is inside.

Time stills. We stop. We breathe. We beat. We are the only warmth in the room.

"_Drink," _the voice in my head commands.

Edward huffs. I bring my lips to his neck and feel his pulse beating underneath dusty skin. Another thrust and we are moving. I kiss and lick and suck to the rhythm of his blood.

"_Drink."_

I hold and bite, unable to pierce. Our movements grow frantic. I dig my heels into his back and my fingers into his biceps.

"_You are his life and his rein."_

"You're my life. You're my meaning," Edward whispers urgently in my ear.

His hand runs up my back and into my hair. He holds my head, tipping it back, his lips never leaving my skin.

"_Drink."_

"I love you," he whispers to the angle of my jaw.

"_See how your blood calls out. See how it warms to your touch. Touch her!"_

I'm slid backward against the wall and he's pressing and lifting and thrusting. We're burning. Light and energy is filling me and fusing us. We're hot and the air is cold and I close my eyes and see red and blue exploding as intense pain radiates from my neck like lightening. I claw and hold and shout.

The air is once again warm and still. Edward and I are bathed in sweat. The iPod has moved on to _Love of a Lifetime_ by Firehouse. He kisses and licks just behind my ear. The ache has become familiar and I try my best to hold him tighter.

His chest rumbles. My melody slips from his lips to bathe my wound.

"Firehouse was totally from the nineties; not the eighties" I laugh.

Edward grins.

"You've been holding out on me," I insist. "That was –"

"That was the power of what we have between us, Bella. That is the love I will hold for eternity. I'm so glad you're safe. I was afraid she'd hurt you."

"I was alone here the whole time."

"Human. Perishable."

"Perishing," I whisper.

His fingers are delicate as they sweep over my cheekbones, as they slide over shoulders and hold my hips.

"I will hold you forever, Bella Swan. Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there."

"That's pretty."

"It's scripture. You make me murmur the words of gods."

"I can't make this choice, Edward."

"You're not supposed to. You're human."

"Who makes my choice, then?"

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><p><strong>Until next time, xoxo ~BDC<strong>


	14. Chapter 14

**Hopefully this makes things more clear... maybe? Thank you all for reading & reviewing. Thank you for entertaining my momrosity. Thank you SereneInNC for beta'ing so soon after seeing Cosmopolis. **

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><p><strong>BPOV<strong>

We lay together and Edward whispers like a lover in my ear. He tickles my ribs, making me squirm and giggle. He is relieved and I can't recall ever reading that emotion on his face before. I sense the sun climbing higher in the dusty pink sky.

"You have the most beautiful tits." He kneads and I sigh. "And the most beautiful eyes." We trade kisses. His fingers slide lower and I wriggle. "And you've got the most beautiful c -"

I giggle and slap his hand away, thankfully silencing him. He pulls my body on top of his and my hair falls into his face. He sputters and swats as he tries to dodge the strands. I shake my head, teasing him with tendrils, laughing.

"You don't like my beautiful hair?"

"It doesn't belong in my beautiful eyeballs."

I grin. He does have beautiful eyeballs. He smiles up at me and pulls me in for a kiss, holding my body to his with a force so swift and sure, I have no choice. His lips press against mine, his chest heaves, he's hard and his hands are firm. I give in. It's easy to do and I want nothing more.

After a kiss with force enough to leave me breathless his hands relax their hold. His smile returns. He sighs.

"You're better now," I whisper.

"You're safe."

"Why wouldn't I be?"

His eyes move past me and I wait. The way he manages to keep a wall up while he thinks, I can't fathom what might be running through his head.

"How are your investments?" I probe.

His hands cup my breasts. "Precious."

"Edward," I admonish.

A hand cups my cheek. "Invaluable."

"I'm being serious."

"As am I. I have my answers. With you in my life I've changed. I will hold you forever, even if you pass. I'll wither and grow gray and my existence will never be the same. My heart will beat until I expire."

My breath catches in my throat. The juxtaposition of his words with his lighthearted, transcendent smile is jarring.

"I can take you with me. Katrina told me how. It's not just a story breathed on the wind. You can rise like a phoenix from the ashes of the living. You and I can walk through the valley of the shadow of death hand in hand. Even I might fear your strength. But I will never leave you. My soul will cleave to yours – the grave cannot sever what the heart holds dear. You can't leave me. I will perish without you."

"No. You can't." I'm firm and insistent.

He pushes the hair from my face. He smiles – his smile goes on forever. "My dear. My heart. My love. There was a story told long ago. God came down and fell in love with the world. You are my world."

"I'm not a world; I'm a woman. And you're not a god. You're a man. You said so yourself."

"I do have a gender and I think you'll agree that I know how to use it."

He presses his _gender_ against me, but I try to ignore. "What happened after the, um… _god_ fell in love?"

"The world died. You know these gods. These myths. They exist as stories. They'll remember me as your story, like Zeus to the Ancient Greeks."

"And this makes you happy?"

"I know now, Bella. I know that Katrina has left us to find our way. I know what could become of you, and what awaits me. I know. I love you and I've seen our two possible futures. One choice or the other, in body or in spirit, you will be with me forever. This brings me peace. Your warm skin brings me hope. In you I finally find my home."

He's rolled me onto my back. He's brought his forehead to mine. His body hovers, barely touching. His eyes burn.

"Our bodies can be together forever."

"Edward," I try to protest.

"Don't 'Edward' me. Forever, Bella. You and I."

He settles his body on mine. The air feels heavy and electric like the charge before a storm.

"Would you like it?" he asks.

His knees part my thighs.

"Do you want me? This? Forever?"

"I don't believe -"

"Would you like it?" he asks with his lips against mine. "Would you like it?" he asks, holding my hip, finding me ready. I hear myself moan.

"Would you like it?" His hand is knotted in my hair; his hips grind against mine.

"Would… you… like… it?"

In an instant he's sitting on his heels at the foot of the bed. My chest is heaving and my skin is damp. I'm open and incomplete.

"You would like it. Your body, your eyes, your heart, your…" his eyes dip and darken. "You would like eternity together."

He waits a breath and then he's back – on top, around me and inside - and my heart feels as if it might shatter. But I hold tight, with fingers, thighs, heels and teeth. I hold tight and ask myself whether emptiness can compete. I ask whether I can walk away. And then I can't ask anything else, because of the rhythm, and the friction, and his breath and our light.

xXxXx

Later we lay panting. I've given up trying to judge time. Outside the windows the sky is orange and blue. There are lights on in the building across the way. Edward plays with my hair, letting the strands fall through his fingers.

I can't meet his eyes. I'm afraid of what I might say. "I'd have to give up my family."

"As with death."

"And after, I would… you… _killing_?"

Of course, he understands.

"We decide the living from the dead. You know of this necessity. You already understand my place in this world. You explained it to your niece: sometimes people have to die."

My eyes find his. They are soft and wet. I hide my face against his bare chest.

"Don't_ I_ have to die?"

"I'm here, in your bed, irrevocably in love."

"But Edward, that choice…"

He places a finger beneath my chin and tips my head so he can look into my eyes. "That choice is not yours. I was confused. I forgot myself in you. Trust me."

"Trust you?"

"I love you."

"And god came down and fell in love with the world," I murmur.

"What if the world didn't die?" he asks.

"What if she did?"

"That god and his world would be eternally bound. You and I are either a legend and a long lost civilization, or something as constant as the sun."

"I can't decide."

"I can."

"I never had the choice."

He holds my face in his hands.

"Not from the moment I picked you from the crowd – a beautiful mystery in the shadow of death. Not from the moment you agreed to come with me. Didn't you know?"

"I thought you'd kill me."

"So did I."

He places a tender kiss on my lips. I feel air slipping from the lungs in my chest.

"And god fell in love with the world," I whisper.

"You were there for the first beat of my heart. Do you know what you want?" he asks.

"Does it matter?"

"Are you frightened?"

"I've never been frightened of death."

"What about eternal life?"

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><p><strong>Until the next, and possibly last chapter... xxx ~BDC<strong>


	15. Chapter 15

Edward and I returned from Iceland last week, but it could have been last year, or last decade for that matter. Two weeks in his presence and the earth had become untethered to the fabric of time. He rushed me to the edges of the earth and bathed me in glowing pools as the heavens raced fiery flame above our heads. We balanced on rocks above sea and ice at the very spot where the earth had disintegrated and was reborn.

"How does this look to you?" I'd asked breathlessly as we stood on the brink.

Edward looked into my eyes instead of out over the horizon. "The earth was something to pass through, or something that passed me by, until you. You've tamed the monotony." He held the back of my head, lowering his mouth to mine. "You've made the universe something I'd care to lose."

Green and gray fire lit the heavens, sulfur rose from steaming pools, the briny ocean pounded ice and rock and its spray stung my skin.

I sigh and my skin tingles at the memory. As I glance around at my present: the dingy walls of my office, the industrial carpet on the floor, the never ending emails scrolling down the screen of my computer monitor, I want to curl into a ball and gladly remember. Better yet, I want to find my keys, go find my husband, and then find myself reflected back in his emerald eyes.

Returning to reality may have pulled me back to earth, but Edward is lighter these days. His somber mood has lifted. His eyes radiate peace whenever I meet his gaze. Somehow, every time he holds my hand he lets me let go. He's settled comfortably, gratefully, into the possibility of mortality while, for the first time ever, I earnestly wonder at the possibility of a life never-ending.

For the first time since I was six, I face the unknown. Edward calmly holds the key to my afterlife. Unburdened, I've found the will to really live.

xXxXx

**Room 212**

Emily Young was due at the hospital three days from now. She came early, though, doubled over in indescribable pain.

I nod to the interventional radiologist as he's leaving her room.

"Give me a buzz?" he asks me quietly.

I shake Emily's husband's hand. She smiles weakly and invites me to sit on the corner of her hospital bed. She tries her best to act the hostess, as though this were her kitchen instead of a hospital room.

"How's you're pain?" I ask.

"Still there. Better." She works at ironing her bed sheet with her hands.

"We'll keep working on it," I assure. "I'll speak with the nurse about upping the morphine."

Her husband nods gratefully and clutches his wife's hand. But there is a space between Emily and I… a filmy barrier has descended and my words aren't hitting home with her as I'd hoped.

"What is it?" I ask.

Emily chances a glance at her husband before taking a shallow breath and looking me square in the eye. "I need someone to tell me."

"Tell you what?"

I don't keep information from my patients, but I've learned that they hear only what the heart and mind can digest. I sense that Emily has taken a step into deeper waters. I wait. Emily's husband holds his breath. We sit as time ticks by to the sound of a PCA pump and heart monitor.

"Dr. Meltzer was just talking," Emily begins quietly. "He said that we'll do this, for my liver, and then there's something else afterward."

"Absolutely," I agree. "There are many other therapies."

"So, I'll do one thing, and then another, and then another until there's nothing else. That's it, right?"

The air crackles as if the truth has brought life to the space between the three people present. I'm surprised. Patients carry within themselves the uncanny ability to focus on the immediate future. Like a rat in a maze, they hem and haw and focus on the decision right in front of them. They are too close to the situation at hand to notice the incremental shift in direction as they work their way through the puzzle. Degree by degree we are moved until we are turned one hundred and eighty degrees from where we began. Right there, at the beginning is the light. Right there, at the beginning and the end, that's when I see the look in the eye as my patients face where they came from.

In room two-twelve it is too soon. I talk to my patients as they make their own way, but it's often not until those last final turns that they are able to listen. Emily still has a long distance to travel, but she's seen the course.

"This isn't good, is it? It's in my bones and my liver, and now my lungs."

Emily is not reciting new information, but her eyes hold alarm and shake in their sockets. She has seen from on high. She understands.

"We'll go from one thing to the next, and then I'm going to die. Right?"

There's a spark, a quickening that lights the room. The air is charged like it is when Edward is present. I feel the ghosts hovering outside, held at bay by the mystery that yokes us to the living.

Emily's eyes meet mine. Tears brim, but stay within the confines of her eyes. I clutch her hand and she grips back. She pleads silently. I break one of my rules, and nod my head.

"Thank you," she whispers. "I was waiting to hear the truth."

xXxXx

Back in the outpatient clinic I run from exam room to exam room. I have my own physical exam to get to and I've finally agreed to let Edward come with me to see Doctor Banner. I have to face surgery and a failing liver, and for the first time I don't want to face it alone. I want my husband there to hold my hand. I want to come down off of that pedestal I've been stuck on and finally work my way through the maze. I want to see what is right in front of me instead of the grand design. Edward is what is in front of me. Together we can finally both enjoy the walk, even though the destination is inevitable.

Eric Yorkie sits in a wheelchair in room five fifty-two. His skin is thin and dry and small flecks of it bespeckle his shoulders and float to the floor as he reaches for my hand. His eyes are alive, bright and quavering in a skull that is all too visible. His false teeth are too large for his mouth. He smiles.

His parents sit quietly on the edge of their seats.

"How's the pain?" I ask as I lift his shirt to inspect his swollen belly.

"It's gone," he rasps.

"Gone?"

He nods in a loose way. Any stray observer could see that Eric's head is too heavy for him to easily support.

"You said liver failure would be easy, Doc." He tries to laugh, but the sound is dry, like sandpaper on tree bark.

I hold his hand. Our eyes meet. "Those weren't my exact words, and you know it."

"But I knew what you meant, Doc. It's just like you said."

His other hand holds mine.

"I want to know which meds I should take, you know... _now_."

Eric's meaning is clear. He's declined hospice because he is dedicated to living. He's wanted to live from the moment he walked into the office a year and a half ago. He did everything we recommended, from chemotherapy regimens to lifestyle modification, to complementary protocols. Sometimes he would go too far, limiting his diet, adopting punishing exercise regimens. He grew fit, he ate well, he worked full time as a police officer and doted on his niece and nephews. He'd never married. He was thirty-two.

He had an unwavering belief that he would beat his cancer. He worked at it. And he did beat his cancer. His final scans showed no evidence of disease. Unfortunately, the liver that the cancer left in its wake was little more than a ball of scar tissue. Brian was dying of liver failure, instead of colon cancer.

Now, at the end, he sees where he's going, even if he can't bring himself to say it.

"Meds?" he asks again.

I work to keep dry eyes. His mother is not as successful and finds cause to leave the room. I go step by step through the med list with Eric and his father, leaving only what is necessary for palliative care.

"What's next, Doc?" he asks when we're done reviewing the changes. He reaches for my hands again. There is silence. I break another one of my rules.

"Let's have you back here in two weeks," a say very quietly.

The mood in the room immediately lightens. We all feel it. His father smiles and jumps up to find his wife. I've given permission for Eric to live another two weeks. I hold hands. I clasp shoulders. I carefully hug. I write prescriptions for Oxycodone and Oxycontin, enough for another month.

There are sincere smiles as we part ways, but I'll never see Eric Yorkie again.

I leave work with tears in my eyes. I cry silently the entire way to Doctor Banner's office. Edward meets me in the parking lot and I sob in his arms.

xXxXx

"You must be the lucky man."

Doctor Banner greets Edward with a handshake, a fraternal clap on the back and a warm smile.

"I'd say." Edward's arm hugs my shoulders. He kisses my temple. I'm pleasantly embarrassed.

"I was worried when our schedulers couldn't get a hold of you, Bella."

"I… _we_ had to leave town for a while. I know this surgery has to happen, and I know I've been accepting of everything along the way… but _now_?" Edward clutches my hand. I don't want to cry again. "I'm back, though. I'll be a good patient again."

"Bella, please. We can talk surgery, but there's something else that I needed to speak to you about. Kalydeco."

"Excuse me?" Edward asks.

"Your genes, Bella. We tested you back in eighty-nine. We thought it might go somewhere."

My mind scrambles to make the leap from sentiment to science. "CFTR?" I ask.

Doctor Banner nods excitedly.

"You've got to be kidding?" I ask. "A drug? Finally?"

Doctor Banner is beaming.

"It _works_?" I ask.

"It sped through the approval process. Bella, do you know what this could mean?"

I can't catch my breath. Tears come again. "Edward!"

My husband regards Doctor Banner and I quietly. The tears that slip down his face are colored with sorrow. I throw my arms around his neck.

"It means it could be alright, Edward. It means it might be alright."

xXxXx

In the car on the way back home, I babble. I talk of quitting my job. I talk of leaving death and the dying behind. I have been liberated. I've finally found a way, a drug, a lifeline and I've been securely fastened to the ground underneath my feet. I don't want perspective. I want to travel, I want to make love, I want to enjoy my life and my family. I want things to get complicated and messy. I'll tender my resignation. Maybe someday, far in the future, I'll go back to being a doctor. There could be a time far into the future!

"You've been so quiet." I glance at my husband as we're stopped at a red light. Edward appears mournful.

"What is it?" I ask.

He shakes his head. "I love you," he murmurs.

"I know. I love you too!"

I stretch across the console and place a kiss on his lips. He makes a sound like I've punched him in the gut instead.

"What's the matter?" I ask, searching his eyes. "I've just had the best news ever. No more -"

The blinding light and the pain isn't as shocking as the silence that comes a mere instant after screeching tires, shattering glass and metal on metal.

xXxXx

There are two rooms in the unit at the hospital where I used to work, back to back, both occupied by families. Both patients are young men, both are gravely ill. One will die. One will not… yet.

That outcome is not in the lab results or the scans. It is not in the stage or gravity of disease. It is in the room. It is in the mind of attending physicians and astute nurses. It is in the objective air. It is something I've learned to breathe. It is something I've learned to navigate. It is.

"Which one?" Edward asks in a whisper.

I know, but cannot say.

Both families have hung attentive on my every word. Both families have searched my face. I've talked of I.V. drugs and bilirubin levels. We've spoken of interventional procedures and the color of skin on a barely animate bodies. My steady voice would belie the ache in my chest.

"Which one?" he asks.

I won't say. I won't make the choice.

xXxXx

In the hospital, Edward's chair is empty. Instead he is next to me in the bed. He holds my hand. He pushes hair from my face.

"You need to take some time for yourself. Let me sit," I hear my sister say. Her voice brings a smile to my face.

"You can sit, but I won't cede my time," Edward breathes.

"Edward, you need a break."

"No. This is my life now." I feel Edward's hand clutching tighter. Rose places her hand over Edward's, and rests her head on his shoulder. Her smile is sad.

"She thought you were hot, you know."

I feel Edward's fingers trace my cheekbone."

"So did my mom," Rose continues.

Edward smiles. "I loved her from the very first night we…"

Rose coughs. I think I smile.

"I love you," I try to whisper. I am at peace.

His finger rests on the tip of my nose. "She is the only thing that holds meaning in my world, Rosalie. I can't leave."

"I'm so happy she had you."

"To think I could have missed her."

"Some things are just fated."

"Perhaps."

"Don't you think love – this – doesn't it make you believe in something bigger?"

"There's nothing bigger than what I feel for her." Edward's finger whispers over my dry lips. I try to kiss. "Anyone that believes in something bigger has never really loved."

Rose sighs. There are tears in her eyes.

"Don't cry for me," I try to say, but no one hears.

I blink and there is darkness. I float and feel Edward's fingers holding firm.

"We didn't have time for anything," I try to say.

Rose calls for my mother. I open my eyes and Edward is there. His face radiates concern and love… but his eyes are at peace. They are wet.

"I love you," I try to say again.

"My world," he whispers and kisses my nose, presses his forehead against mine. His tears wet my face. His breath bathes me and I am lighter, freer than I have ever been before.

I blink again and watch light break through being – watch it burst through the space around me, around my husband and my love, and in a silent second I realize that I've been wrong my entire life; the veil doesn't descend when a person dies. When you die the veil is lifted. When the veil is lifted there is a light.

At the end I feel his lips. There is a decision there, one I trust him to make.

I am a story. He is my god.

He gave me everything I was afraid to hope for: love, desire, and uncertainty about my end. I feel so grateful that he found me, although I suppose that in the end he finds us all. My story is different only in the fact that I loved him and he loved me right back.

xXxXx

**A/N: So there it is… Nic the Fic Whisperer once called this fanfic suicide. Maybe…**

**I want to say thanks, though. This was not a story as much as a way to work through my thoughts and feelings as I was confronted with death on a daily basis. Ironically, I probably have the job that I do because I couldn't come to terms with the idea that I'm mortal. I fell as hard as I did for Twilight Edward for the same reason. This un-story is the most personal thing I've probably ever put to virtual paper – so, thank you for indulging me.**

**Sorry this last chapter has taken so long to post.**

**On a much, much lighter side… I've been writing a new fic as I kept putting this sad chapter off. It's thankfully AH, and very, very much different from this life and death thing I've been immersed in. I'm several chapters in, so keep an eye out if you care to. It's called Shame.**

**Also, sincere congratulations to Fiction Freak95 for Blind Spot being named Fic of the Year over at the Lemonade Stand! It's much deserved. Go read it if you haven't already.**

**See you sometime soon. I don't think I could really ever quit this fanfic thing if I tried.**

**XXX ~BDC**


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